
Book /EO- 



/ 









J2",- 



u n a * 



AN 



ANALYSIS 



EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY: 

TO WHICH IS SUBJOINED, 

A CRITICAL EXAMINATION 

OF 

THE REMAINS 

Of 

Cgppttan £^onoloa£* 



J. C. PRICHARD, M. D. 



LONDON : 
PRINTED FOR JOHN AND ARTHUR ARCH, CORNHIIA. 

1819. 






Printed by Browne & Manchee, Bristol. 



PREFACE. 



The celebrated cc Pantheon iEgyptiorum " of 
Paul Ernest Jablonski has been so long and so 
justly held in the highest estimation by the 
learned, that any new attempt to explain the 
riddles of the ancient Egyptian Mythology may 
seem, to those who are acquainted with that 
work, to be a superfluous and a hopeless task. 
To me, at least, it appears so probable that such 
will be the impression with which many persons 
will read the title of this volume, that I feel it 
incumbent upon me to give some account of my 
motives in offering it to the Public. 

The following treatise owes its existence, or at 
least its publication in the present form, to some 
observations which a late writer of distinguished 
learning has founded on a review of Jablonski's 
work. The facts which it has developed, he 
remarks, inevitably lead us to the conclusion 
" that the Egyptian religion is the produce of 
the country, peculiar to itself, and without any 



11 PREFACE. 

marks of foreign improvement or innovation. 
Isis, Osiris, Ammoun, Typhon, and Thoth, are 
natives of Egypt, receive their names from its 
vernacular language, and worship from its 
physical situation."* 

If this conclusion should be adopted, and 
it should be allowed that the religion and 
philosophy, as well as the language, and all the 
other possessions of the Egyptian people, were 
peculiar to themselves, and entirely unconnected 
with those which belonged to other nations of 
antiquity, we shall perhaps be obliged to admit 
the inference which has been deduced respecting 
the origin of the Egyptian race ;-f though it 
contradicts the testimony of the Sacred Records, 
the earliest memorials of mankind, and is at 
variance with the general observations that result 



* Travels of James Bruce, Esq. to discover the source of 
the Nile. Third edition, Appendix to Book ii, No. 1 (by the 
learned Editor.) 

It must be remarked that although this is the conclusion to 
which Professor Murray has been led by Jablonski's work, it 
was by no means the opinion of that author himself. On the 
contrary, he regarded the Egyptian mythology as allied in its 
origin to the superstitions of Eastern Asia, and mentions the 
writings of the Brahmans among the sources whence we may 
expect to derive a further and most important elucidation of 
its doctrines. See " Pantheon iEgyptiorum," in prolegomenis. 

f The author cited above seems to infer that the Egyptians 
were a race peculiar to Africa, and originally distinct from the 
posterity of Noah and of Adam. 



PREFACE. Ill 

from a survey of the organized world, and the 
distribution of species over the globe.* 

I have been induced by this consideration to 
examine the data from which the conclusion 
before mentioned has been obtained; and the 
results of this inquiry, together with the grounds 
on which it has proceeded, are laid before my 
readers in the following pages. 

In the composition of this work, and particularly 
in the first Book, my labour has been greatly 
facilitated by the ample collection of passages 
from the ancient writers referring to Egypt, which 
is comprised in the pages of Jablonski. No man 
can be more willing than myself to admit the 
high merits of this author, whose acuteness and 
ingenuity were equal to his profound learning; 
but it appears to me that he has been led into 
some errors, the result of his fondness for refined 
and erudite explanations, and for eliciting from 



* I have elsewhere endeavoured to prove that the various 
branches of mankind form but one species, and that the Law 
or Method of Nature, in replenishing the earth with locomotive 
beings, has been the original production of one stock, or 
family in each species, and the subsequent dispersion of it 
over the globe. Researches into the Physical History of 
Man. London, 1813. 

In the late work of Mr. Lawrence, entitled " Lectures on 
Comparative Anatomy, and the Natural History of Man," the 
unity of species in mankind has been demonstrated with 
great ability, and by a more comprehensive survey of facts 
than any former writer has attempted. 



IV PREFACE. 

every popular superstition a dignified and 
philosophical meaning. Another circumstance 
has been unfortunate, unless I am mistaken, for 
the accuracy of his conclusions : I mean the 
undue reliance he placed on the doubtful 
evidence of etymology, for which a profound 
acquaintance with the remains of the Coptic 
language and literature, joined to a great fertility 
of conjecture, seems to have given him a 
predilection. 

In the following treatise I have placed no 
dependance on that fallacious testimony which 
has so often led the antiquarian astray, and 
have confined myself to the evidence which I 
have been able to collect from the ancient 
authors, and from some collateral sources of 
information that were scarcely accessible to the 
author of the Pantheon. It may be objected that 
I have transgressed the limits of my original plan, 
which was the comparison of the Egyptian 
doctrine with the Asiatic mythologies, by availing 
myself of these very mythologies for explaining 
the superstition of Egypt. But I have only 
applied to this resource under certain restric- 
tions, which have, as I hope, secured me from 
the charge of reasoning in a circle. Having 
once entered upon the subject, I became desirous 
of presenting my readers with as complete an 
account as the existing materials enabled me to 
supply, of the Egyptian religion and philosophy ; 



PREFACE. V 

and, in order to elucidate, as far as possible, a 
subject involved in no small degree of obscurity, 
I found it necessary to examine the relations 
which this system of mythology bore to the 
doctrines and observances of other nations. 

Although my ultimate object has been the 
illustration of an historical question, I have made 
no allusion to it in the following treatise. The 
inferences I wish to deduce are sufficiently 
obvious. 

I am not without some further hope that this 
work, as well as every other careful research into 
heathen superstitions, may also tend to another and 
a not less important result. The more diligently 
we examine the moral and religious history of 
those nations who were destitute of the light of 
revelation, the stronger is our impression of their 
extreme debasement and mental darkness, and the 
more just will be our estimate of those means by 
which Divine Providence has been pleased to 
deliver us from the atrocious barbarism and 
unmitigated depravity, in which our pagan 
ancestors were involved. To this effect an atten- 
tive survey of the religious dogmas and practices 
of the most learned people of the primitive world 
will not fail to contribute its due share. 

I cannot but be sensible of many imperfections 
in a work composed during the moments of relax- 
ation from the duties of an active profession ; but 
I am aware that the tribunal of criticism is 



VI PREFACE. 



scarcely to be propitiated by any representations 
of a private or personal nature, and that I must 
be content to await a judgment that will 
depend on the degree of success which my 
attempt shall be thought to have attained. 



Subjoined to the treatise on Egyptian Mytho- 
logy is an Analysis of the Remains of the Chro- 
nology and History of the same people, of which 
it is necessary to give some account, as this is 
not closely connected with the scope of the 
preceding work. 

The historical records of ancient Egypt have 
been supposed to claim a degree of antiquity, 
which far exceeds the duration of the human 
race, as deduced from the Sacred Scriptures. 
Various expedients have been devised for recon- 
ciling this discrepancy, of which the hypothesis 
of Sir John Marsham is the most celebrated. 
Yet, it is a mere hypothesis, and is far from 
having the support, as I have endeavoured to 
show, of historical evidence, as far as such 
evidence can be collected. 

My readers will demand with what prospect 
of success I have presumed to enter upon a field 
which has been so often abandoned in despair? 
— with what hope I have solicited their attention 
to a disquisition on a mass of contradictory frag, 
ments, which so many learned men have in vain 



PREFACE. Vll 

attempted to reduce into order ? My reply must 
be, that I believe myself to have fallen by chance 
upon the clue by which the enigma is to be 
solved. In repeatedly examining the fragments 
of these Chronicles, I thought I perceived some 
phenomena that seemed to explain the principle 
on which they were originally constructed, and 
promised to connect the whole into one system. 
The more I investigated the matter, the more I 
became convinced that I was not deceived by 
fallacious appearances, or by merely accidental 
coincidences. Of this, however, my readers will 
now judge. I shall only premise that, if I am 
correct in my conjectures, there is in reality no 
want of harmony between the historical records 
of the ancient Egyptians and those contained 
in the Sacred Scriptures ; that, on the contrary, 
the antiquity assumed for the Egyptian nation, 
from their own archives, is far within the era 
assigned by the chronology of the LXX, for 
the second origin of mankind. 

The treatise on Egyptian Chronology w r as 
written, for the most part, some years ago ; and 
I avail myself of the present opportunity of 
presenting it to the Public. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Preface ~Pp. i.— viii. 

INTRODUCTION. 

ON THE SOURCES OF INFORMATION RESPECTING THE 
LEARNING AND MYTHOLOGY OF EGYPT. 

Four Sources of Information. 1. Facts recorded by personal 
observers. Writers of this class subsequent to the Macedo- 
nian Conquest — Under the Persian Era — Under the Kingdom 
of the Pharaohs. 2. Ancient Writers on Mythology — Plutarch, 
Porphyry, Macrobius, and others. Inquiry whence these writers 
derived their information. 3. Ancient Schools, whose founders 
borrowed their discipline from Egypt — Orpheus, Pythagoras, 
Thales. 4. Comparison of the Egyptian Fables and Doc- 
trines with those of the Brahmans. Coptic Etymologies — 
fallacies , Pp. 1— -17 

BOOK I. 

OF THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS, COM- 
PREHENDING THEIR THEOGONY, AND THE FABULOUS 
HISTORY OP THEIR GODS. 

CHAPTER I. 

OF THE NATURE OF THE EGYPTIAN GODS IN GENERAL. 

PAGE 

Section I. Different Ideas respecting the Nature of the 
Egyptian Gods , 19 



X TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Section II. Reference to the Mythologies of the Greeks 
and Romans , 24 

Section III. Testimonies of the Ancient Writers respecting 
the Egyptian Mythology in general : of Diodorus — Macro- 
bins — Chseremon — Eusebius — lamblichus. Conclusion.. 27 

Section IV. Attempt to penetrate further into the Meaning 
of the Egyptian Fables. Analysis of the Orphic^Fictions, 
and other mystical Representations derived from Egypt . . 36 

COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER I. 

Note A. On the Nature of the Egyptian Gods 48 

Note B. Physical Doctrine of Ocellus 51 

CHAPTER II. 

OF THE WORSHIP OF ISIS AND OSIRIS, HORUS AND TYPHON. 

Section I. Recapitulation of the Orphic Doctrine. Orphic 
Dionusus and Damater, compared with Osiris and Isis. 

Legend of Osiris and Isis 53 

Section II. Interpretation of the Legend of Isis and Osiris . . 62 
Section III. Continuation of the same subject. General 
Conclusion respecting the nature of Osiris. Typhon, 
Horus, Egyptian Triad, Harpocrates, Serapis 75 

COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 

Note A. On the Five Deities of the Intercalary Days 95 

Note B. On Coptic Etymologies of the name of Osiris 96 

Note B. On the Isiac Festival 97 

Note C. Great Festival of the Persians 98 

Note D. Egyptian Festivals and System of the Calendar 103 

CHAPTER III 

OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

Section I. Of some Emblematical Representations of the Sun 105 
Section II. Of the hypothesis of Jablonski, and some other 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. XI 

PAG2 

writers, respecting Serapis, Harpocrates, Horus, Jupiter 

Amnion, Hercules, and Pan 107 

Section III. Amnion, or the Egyptian Jupiter 112 

Section IV. The Egyptian Hercules 115 

Section V. Mendes, the Egyptian Pan 119 

Section VI. Papremis, the Egyptian Mars 121 

Section VII. Anubis 123 

Section VIII. Thoth, the Egyptian Mercury 126 

CHAPTER IV. 

OF THE EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

Section I. Of Isis 131 

Section II. Of Bubastis, the Egyptian Diana 134 

Section III. Of Eilethyia 140 

Section IV. Of Isis in her maleficent or vindictive character. 

Tithrambo, Hecate, or Brimo , 141 

Section V. Nephthys, or Venus Urania 145 

Section VI. Buto, or Latona , 151 

COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER IV. 

Remarks on Jablonski's Opinion respecting Bubastis or 
Diana, and Buto or Latona 155 

SUPPLEMENT TO BOOK I. 

Of the Egyptian Gods, collectively 157 



BOOK II. 

ON THE PHILOSOPHICAL DOCTRINE, COSMOGONY, ETC, 
OF THE EGYPTIANS. 



CHAPTER I. 

INQUIRY INTO THE ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY OF THE 

EGYPTIANS RESPECTING THE SUPREME DEITY, 

AND THE ORIGIN OF THE WORLD. 



XII TABLE OF CONTENTS, 

TAGK 

Analysis of the Orphic and Pythagorean Cosmogonies — Frag- 
ments referring to the Egyptian Cosmogony compared 
with the foregoing „ f t m 1(55 

CHAPTER II. 

OF THE DOCTRINE OF ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS AND 
RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 

Survey of this Doctrine as it occurs in the Philosophy of the 
Grecian Schools — Cataclysm, or destruction by Water — 
Ecpyrosis, or destruction by Fire. Connection of these 
events with Astronomical Periods, and with the Moral 
Corruption of the Human Race. Derivation of this 
doctrine from Egypt 177 

SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER II. 

Illustration of the foregoing Fiction, from the Fables of other 
Nations 189 

CHAPTER III. 

OPINIONS OF THE EGYPTIANS RESPECTING THE FATE OF THE 

DEAD. 

Motives for embalming Bodies — Ultimate Allotment of the 
Soul—Emanation from, and Refusion into the Deity .... 195 

SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER III. 

Further illustration of the Egyptian Doctrine respecting the 
Soul. Comparison of the Egyptian Psychology with that 
of the Hindoos , 313 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. X1U 



BOOK III 



ATTEMPT TO ILLUSTRATE THE EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY, 

BY COMPARING IT WITH THE SUPERSTITIONS 

OF THE EAST. 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTION. 

TAGE 

Section I. Preliminary Remarks 221 

Section II General Observations on the History of the Indian 
Mythology 223 

CHAPTER II. 

OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY OF THE HINDOO MYTHOLOGY. 

Section I. Doctrine of the Emanation and Transmigration of 

Souls 227 

Section II. Of the Belief in Astrology, and of the Worship 

of Nature ,...., 239 

Section III Of the Doctrine of Two Principles 241 

Section IV. Of the System of Pantheism 249 

Section V. Continuation of the same subject. Succession of 
Philosophical Doctrines and Mythologies in the East .... 252 

CHAPTER III. 

COMPARISON BETWEEN THE SUCCESSION OF SUPERSTITIONS 

IN THE EASTj AND THE HISTORY OF MYTHOLOGY 

IN EGYPT. 

Section I. General Resemblances between the Indian and 
Egyptian Mythologies in the Conception of the Divine 
Nature 2(55 

Section II. Of the Forms of Eastern Mythology, to which 
the Superstition of Egypt is particularly related. Indian 
Iswara, or Rudra, compared with Osiris and Typhon — 
Comparison of Bhavani with Isis 269 



XIV TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



FAGE 



Section III. Indian Fables relating to Vishnu, compared with 
the Egyptian Mythology. Fictions respecting Vishnu 
resembling those that were connected with Horus , 283 

Section IV 7 . Esoteric Philosophy of the Egyptians, compared 
with the Doctrines of the Hindoos, in the earliest periods. 
Egyptian and Hindoo Cosmogonies, &c 287 

Section V. General Inferences respecting the Origin and 
History of Mythology , 293 



BOOK IV. 

OF THE EXOTERIC OR POPULAR WORSHIP OF THE 

EGYPTIANS, AND OF THE VARIOUS CIVIL 

INSTITUTIONS EMANATING FROM 

THEIR RELIGION. 



CHAPTER I. 

OF THE WORSHIP OF ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 

Section I Introductory Remarks 301 

Section II. Of the Veneration paid to Animals in general . . 303 

Section III. Of the Worship of Quadrupeds : 1. Of Oxen. 
2. Of Dogs. 3. Of Cats. 4, Of the Wolf. 5. Of the 
Ram. 6. Of the Goat. 7. Of the Deer. 8. Of Monkeys 
and Apes. 9. Of the Ichneumon. 10. Of the Shrew- 
Mouse. 11. Of the Lion. 12. Of the Hippopotamos. 13. 
Of Impure Animals * « 305 

Section IV. Of the Worship of Birds: 1. Of the Hawk 
2. Of the Crow. 3. Of the Vulture. 4. Of the Eagle. 
5. Of the Ibis. 6. Of the Goose 317 

Section V. Of fabulous Birds which are traced in the Egyp- 
tian Mythology. The Phesnix 320 

Section VI. Of the Worship of Reptiles, Insects, Fishes, 
Plants, &c. L Of the Crocodile. 2. Of Serpents. 3. Of 
Insects. 4. Of Fishes. 5. Of Plants. 6. Of Stones 323 

Section VII. Of the Motives which led the Egyptians to 
the Worship of Animals and Plants. Different Opinions 
on this subject. Hypothesis of Diodorus and Plutarch — 






TABLE OF CONTENTS. XV 

PAGE 

Hypothesis of Lucian and Dupuis. True Explanation, sup- 
ported by the testimonies of Porphyry, Plutarch, and 
Diodorus — Egyptian Avatars, or Incarnations of the Gods 3 

Explanation of the Worship of Plants and Stones 330 

Section VIII. Of the Worship of Men 345 

Section IX. Of the Antiquity of the Worship of Animals in 
Egypt , . c * 350 

NOTE ON BOOK IV. CHAPTER I. 

Confirmation of the foregoing explanation from the Fictions of 
the Hindoos. 1. Of the sacred Quadrupeds of the Hindoos. 
2. Of their sacred Birds. 3. Of their sacred Fishes, 
Reptiles, and Inanimate Objects 353 

CHAPTER II. 

OF SACRIFICES, FESTIVALS, AND RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES 
OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

Notions connected with the Performance of Sacrifice. Of 
Human Sacrifices. Of the Sacrifices of Animals — of Swine 
— of Bulls — of Sheep — of Goats. Of Ceremonies relating 
to Typhon. Annual Festivals of the Egyptians 359 

CHAPTER III. 

OF THE CIVIL INSTITUTIONS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

Section I. Distribution of the People into Castes. Enume- 
ration of the Castes, and Description of them 373 

Section II. Description of the Hierarchy or Hereditary Priest- 
hood, and its Subdivisions .'. 3/9 

Section III. Religious Observances of the Sacerdotal Class 
in Egypt , 3S9 

NOTE ON BOOK IV. CHAPTER III. 

Illustrations derived from the Institutions of the Hindoos . . 397 



XVI TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IV. 

COMPARISON OF THE MOSAIC ORDINANCES WITH THB 
LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

PAGE 

Section I. Introduction 405 

Section II. Theological Doctrine of Moses compared with 
that of the Egyptians 406 

Section III. Political and Civil Institutions of Moses, com- 
pared with those of the Egyptians 408 

Section IV. Comparison of the Ceremonial Law of Moses 
with that of the Egyptians 416 

Section V. Origin of Circumcision , • « 424 



CONTENTS 



CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF THE REMAINS OF 
EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY. 



PART I. 

SURVEY OF THE SOURCES OF INFORMATION/ 
COMPILATION OF MATERIALS. 

FACE 

Section I. Origin of History. Probable Antiquity of the 

Oldest Records *3 

Section II Antiquity of the Egyptian Records. Historical 
Books. Inscriptions. Syringes *4 

Section 111. Authors from whom we have received Infor- 
mation respecting the Egyptian History. Manethon. 
Un Known Author of the Old Chronicle. Eratosthenes. 
Syncellus. Ptolemy of Mendes. Apion. Chieremon. 
Herodotus. jDiodoruSj and others *10 

Section IV. Copy of the Old Chronicle and the Chronicle 

of Manethon *19 

Section V Comparison of the two foregoing Chronicles . . *36 

Section VI. Series of Syncellus *39 

Section VII. Egyptian Chronology according to Herodotus 
and Diodorus Siculus *4 1 

Section VIII. Remains of the Laterculus of Eratosthenes . . *44 



XV111 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

PART II. 

ANALYSIS OF THE FOREGOING DOCUMENTS. 

PAGE 

Section I. Preliminary Observations *49 

Section II. Dates of the Egyptian Chronology computed 
upward, from the Persian conquest to the accession of 
Psammitiehus *51 

Section III. Dates of the. Egyptian Chronology computed 
upwards from Psammitiehus to the period when Egypt 
became subject to the Ethiopian Kings *54 

Section IV. Of the Four Dynasties which preceded the 
Ethiopian Conquest, viz. the 21st, 22d, 23d, and 24th . . *53 

Section V. Of the 19th and 20th Dynasties— Of the 18th 
Dynasty, and the Period of the Exode of the Israelites 
from Egypt — History of the Hycsos from Manethon— 
Hycsos expelled by Tethmosis — Hycsos expelled by Ame- 
nophis, under the guidance of Osarsiph, or Moses. History 
of the Exode, as related by Chseremon, Lysimachus, 
Apollonius, Tacitus, Diodorus. Date of the Exode, as 
deduced from Egyptian Histories # 60 

Section VI. Of the first Seventeen Dynasties in the Chronicle 
of Manethon. Principles on which this Chronicle was 
constructed. Date of the Commencement of the Egyptian 
Monarchy *S7 

Section VII. Connection of the Earlier and Later Parts of 
the Egyptian Chronology. General Survey of the System 
of the Egyptian Chronicles *I 12 

CONCLUSION. 

NOTES TO THE TREATISE ON THE EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY. 

Note A. On the Remains of Remote Antiquity, preserved in 
the Book of Genesis *127 

Note B. On the Scriptural Date of the building of Solomon's 
Temple, and of the Exode *I31 

Note C. On the Date of the Trojan War *135 



INTRODUCTION. 



ON THE SOURCES OF INFORMATION RESPECTING THE 
LEARNING AND MYTHOLOGY OF EGYPT. 



There are four sources whence we may chiefly 
expect to derive information respecting the learning, 
the superstitious practices., and the religious fables,, 
of the ancient Egyptians. 

The most important of these, since it affords us 
information of the most authentic description, is to 
be found in the works of a few ancient writers who 
visited Egypt, and who have described what they 
personally witnessed. 

The power of the Egyptian hierarchy had declined 
from the age of Psammitichus, who first encouraged 
the intercourse of his subjects with foreigners, and 
thereby endangered the influence of those super- 
stitions which, during some thousand years, had 
maintained the character impressed by ancient 
priestcraft on the people of Egypt. But the con- 
quest of the whole country by the arms of Persia, 
the wanton tyranny of Cambyses, and the continual 
discountenance which the old religion sustained 
while Egypt was under the dominion of a nation 
who were disposed to persecute idolatry, must 



INTRODUCTION. 



have introduced many important innovations on the 
ancient system. It is probable that some former 
rites were discontinued during this period, the priests 
finding them no longer practicable, or the people 
being deterred from the performance of them. 

After the Macedonian conquest, the state of things 
was again altered. The Greeks bore no enmity to 
the superstitions of Egypt: they were aware that 
this country had been the cradle of their own mytho- 
logy. The Ptolemies were desirous of gaining the 
affections of the native people, and they patronised 
the priesthood. The idolatrous worship of Egypt 
recovered a portion of its former splendour; but its 
features now bore an impression in many respects 
different from that of antiquity. The rites and the 
fictions of the followers of Hermes were blended with 
the exotic customs and philosophy of their European 
conquerors. The aspect of the national manners 
and religion was less genuine and less peculiar. 

From the time of the first Ptolemies, the mytholo- 
gical learning and superstition of Egypt underwent a 
gradual decline, but sustained no great catastrophe, 
until the period when they were doomed finally to 
vanish, together with all other forms of idolatry, be- 
fore the increasing light of Christianity. The con- 
quest of Egypt by the Romans introduced no sudden 
change, and the old religion only suffered by the decay 
of opulence, and the failure of local patronage, which 
naturally ensued, in consequence of the reduction of 
the country to the condition of a province. As late as 
the time of Strabo, there were persons who assumed 
the character and pretensions of the order of Sacred 
Scribes, the depositaries of the Hermetic learning. 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 3 

The old gods of the Egyptians were still fed in their 
ancient temples ; nor does it appear that any attempt 
was made to supplant them with Grecian or Roman 
idols. The worshippers of serpents and crocodiles 
had indeed to encounter the banter and ridicule of 
the Greeks; but so far was this from putting them to 
shame, or loosening the hold of their superstition, 
that they bore triumphantly into the country of their 
conquerors the strange magical ceremonies of their 
native priests; and the pomps and mysteries of Isis 
and Osiris, even in the metropolis of the civilized 
world, disputed the palm with Jupiter of the Capitol. 

The history of Egyptian superstition thus divides 
itself into three periods. Its golden age was, while 
the power of the hierarchy was unbroken, before the 
Persian conquest, or the introduction of foreign 
manners. The second period comprises the time 
which elapsed from this era till the accession of the 
Ptolemies. The third begins with the reign of Lagus, 
and ends with the extinction of Paganism. 

The information to be derived from travellers in 
Egypt is to be prized nearly in proportion to the 
antiquity of the writers. The accounts of those who 
visited this country during the third period are less 
valuable than the testimonies of the few travellers 
who surveyed it while under the Persian sway; and 
the latter may be supposed to afford us less genuine 
information than we might have obtained from the 
age of the Pharaohs. 

We know the names of several Grecian travellers 
who frequented the Egyptian colleges before the in- 
vasion of Cambyses ; such as Orpheus, Thales, and 
Pythagoras. The latter of these philosophers is said 



fk INTRODUCTION. 

to have enjoyed more extensive opportunities of in- 
struction than any of his countrymen. The greatest 
misfortune is, that if these travellers wrote any 
accounts of what they witnessed, none have survived 
to our times. 

There is only one author who has furnished us with 
a record of his personal observation in the kingdom 
of the Pharaohs. Moses was educated in the learn- 
ing of the Egyptians; his accounts are the most au- 
thentic, and the information they afford is extremely 
valuable, though it is limited : it was not the design 
of this historian to gratify the curiosity of modern 
philosophers. 

During the reign of the, Persians, Egypt was visited 
by Hecataeus, Herodotus, and Plato. The works of 
the former have perished, with the exception of a few 
fragments; and the latter has left no narrative of his 
voyage. Herodotus is our greatest authority: we 
have only to regret that, either through ignorance, 
or influenced by prudential motives, he has concealed 
many circumstances relating to the Egyptian super- 
stition, of which we might have hoped for an ample 
explanation. Being entirely ignorant of the Egyp- 
tian language, he was wholly dependant on the 
information given him by interpreters. 

Diodorus Siculus, and Strabo, saw Egypt under 
the Csesars. These writers appear to have given us 
faithful accounts of all that they witnessed. From 
Tacitus, Ammianus Marcellinus, and some other 
Romans, we derive the knowledge of a few facts. 

II. A much larger portion of information, though 
not altogether of so authentic a description, is 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. O 

contained in the works of several writers of a different 
class, who flourished subsequently to the conquest 
of Egypt by the Macedonians. These were chiefly 
persons of an inquisitive turn, who, living in a more 
enlightened age than their predecessors, had imbibed 
the notion, dangerous to the established religions of 
the Pagan world, that its mythological tales were not 
to be received in their literal sense, but required a 
philosophical analysis, in order to develope truths 
which had been concealed in mysterious language 
by the ancient hierophants. This, however, was the 
last stand made by Paganism against the victorious 
advances of a purer faith. In this contest the 
advocates of the old religion turned themselves to 
every quarter, where they hoped to find something 
that afforded an excuse for former practices; and in 
attempting to defend the fables of polytheism, they 
were contented, and even anxious, to resolve them 
all into allegories. These pretensions, though they 
appear not to have been wholly without foundation, 
were resisted by the Christian fathers; and in the 
course of the controversy which ensued, many cu- 
rious documents were brought to light, which would 
otherwise have perished in oblivion, and which 
contribute to throw very important light upon the 
history of Pagan rites and fables. 

The most judicious of the apologists of Paganism, 
are Plutarch and Macrobius, who profess to found 
their interpretations of ancient fables on the remains 
of mystical literature and mythology. Porphyry, 
who lived at a period when these subjects were 
keenly agitated, possessed, though under the in- 
fluence of strong prejudices, great discernment, and 



O INTRODUCTION. 

an uncommon share of erudition. Iamblichus was a 
strenuous votary of the occult sciences, and full of 
the worst mysticism of the Alexandrine school; yet 
his works contain valuable information respecting 
the prevailing opinions of the most learned Pagans 
of his own and of preceding ages. But the most 
compendious and instructive writer is Diodorus, who 
must be mentioned also among the authors of this 
class, since he has not confined himself to giving us 
the fruit of his own personal observation, but has 
collected whatever he deemed most valuable from 
other writers. 

In the same department we may reckon several 
Fathers of the Church, as Clemens, Origen, Eusebius, 
and Augustin, who, in their writings in refutation of 
Paganism, have preserved many extracts from various 
authors, whose works are lost. 

The value of most of these remains depends on 
the solution of the inquiry, from what quarters 
the authors derived their materials. Was there any 
original and genuine fund of ancient literature and 
philosophy, from which they have drawn their eluci- 
dations? or have they only given us the reveries of 
Grecian speculators? This is a question which it is 
not easy to determine satisfactorily. 

It seems, indeed, to be unquestionable, that a great 
number of books were preserved in the Egyptian 
temples, composed at various times by learned men 
of the sacerdotal order, which treated of the different 
branches of philosophy and mystical learning. These 
were called Hermaic books, or books of Hermes ; the 
name importing, not that they had been all written 
by the sage who bore that celebrated name, but that 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 7 

the authors were persons favoured and inspired by 
the god of wisdom.* Clemens informs us that thirty- 
six of these books were carried by the several orders 
of priests in the religious processions in honour of 
Isis. These were the books which it was necessary 
for the different classes of priests to study, in order to 
learn their respective duties. The first contained 
the hymns that were to be sung in honour of the 
gods; the second, precepts referring to the duties 
and conduct of the king. Four books treated of 
astrology, the positions of the fixed stars, the con- 
junctions of the sun and moon, and the risings of the 
heavenly bodies, with reference, as it should seem, 
to the predictions founded upon them. The ten 
hieroglyphical books comprised cosmography, geo- 
graphy, the movements of the sun and moon, and 
five planets ; the topography of Egypt and the Nile ; 
a description of the instruments used in sacrifice, and 
the places appointed for its celebration. Ten other 
books described the honours to be paid to the gods, 
and the method of the Egyptian rites, respecting 
sacrifices, first-fruits, hymns, prayers, processions, 
festivals, and other similar matters. Ten books, 
which were distinguished by the term Sacerdotal, 
comprised the laws, the history of the gods, and the 
whole discipline of the priests. Besides these thirty- 
six books, there were six others that treated of medi- 
cine, viz. on the structure of the body, on distempers, 
on surgical instruments, on drugs, on diseases of the 

* Iamblichus says, that Hermes was the god of all celestial 
science; that he inspired the priests, who, accordingly, 
inscribed their own commentaries with the name of Hermes. 
— Iamblich, de Myst, 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

eyes, and on complaints peculiar to women. This 
enumeration contains the most important of the 
books ascribed to Hermes ; but it appears, from 
the expressions of Clemens, that it did not comprise 
the whole number. 

Galen has cited an Hermaic book, relating to 
medicine, which seems to have been different from 
any of those before mentioned. He says it treated 
of the thirty-six herbs of the horoscopes. It probably 
contained a system of incantations by drugs ; for we 
are elsewhere informed that the Egyptians believed 
the human body to be distributed into thirty-six 
parts, each of which was under the particular go- 
vernment of one of the decans or aerial daemons, who 
presided over the triple divisions of the twelve signs. 
Origen adds, that when any part of the body was 
diseased, a cure was obtained by invoking the daemon 
to whose province it belonged.* 

Other writers mention the Hermaic books as au- 
thentic sources of information, and as the depositories 
of ancient learning. Plutarch cites them by hearsay, 
or reports facts which were said to be derived from 
them. It is evident that he was unacquainted with 
them, and doubtless he was unable to read the sacred 
characters or the language of Egypt. Iamblichus 
says, the number ofbooks termed Hermaic amounted 
to thirty-six thousand five hundred and twenty-four: 
an incredible account. 

On the whole, it seems historically certain that a 
great number of books were preserved in the temples 
of Egypt, written partly in hieroglyphics and partly 
in other characters, which were ascribed to Hermes., 

* Celsus apud Origen. — Lib. viii. p. 416, ed. Cantab. 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. V 

or rather dedicated to him, and supposed to have 
been written under his spiritual superintendance; 
that these books contained the principal doctrines 
of the Egyptian priests, and the concealed inter- 
pretation of their fables, together with all that they 
possessed of learning and philosophy. The litera- 
ture of ancient Egypt was then preserved, not only 
down to the age of the Macedonian conquest, but as 
long as the Pagan superstition survived.* 

But all this was locked up and sealed under the 
impenetrable veil of sacerdotal mystery. We have 
no reason to believe that any Greek or Roman of the 
Ptolemaic or Imperial ages ever became acquainted 
with the native language of Egypt. The memorials 
inscribed on the pillars of Thoth, or in the books of 
the thrice great philosopher, were alike inaccessible 
to strangers, whether they were written in the hiero- 
glyphic or in common characters. Had it depended 
on them, the wisdom or folly of antiquity would have 
passed away without leaving any discernible vestiges 
to later times. But the learned natives of Egypt 
were attracted, by the magnificence of the Ptolemies^ 

* It may be asked, if this were true, why the Christians, 
who translated the Scriptures into the Egyptian language, did 
not adopt the ly/woia* y^ujj^ta, or the national or epistolary 
character of the old Egyptians, instead of inventing a new 
letter. Probably the knowledge of these characters as well as 
that of the hieroglyphics, was confined to the priests; and if 
so, , they were only adopted in the ancient or sacerdotal dialect, 
and unknown to the Christian converts. Besides, we have as 
yet no proof that these characters were alphabetic letters ; and 
if they were founded on the hieroglyphics, they must have been 
so intimately connected with the old superstitions, as to be 
very unfit instruments for expressing the truths of Christianity. 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

to the school of Alexandria. There they imparted 
their knowledge of astronomy and other branches 
of science to their conquerors, and acquired the 
Greek language, which continued for a thousand 
years to be the medium of learned conversation and 
writing through a great part of the civilized world. 
Here they were encouraged to transf r the memo- 
rials of their dynasties, and the institutes of their 
ancient hierarchy, into the Greek language. It is 
true that they acquired, together with the idiom of 
their conquerors, modes of thinking which were 
widely different from their ancient domestic habits. 
Accordingly we cannot believe that their writings 
displayed the genuine representation of Egyptian 
antiquity, altogether free from the prejudices and 
distorted conceptions of the Greeks. Yet it is just 
to suppose that their works contained whatever was 
the most important or most singular in the ancient 
Hermetic volumes. 

lamblichus, indeed, assures us that faithful trans- 
lations of the Egyptian books existed in the Greek 
language; he adds, that these were unjustly sus- 
pected of being impostures, from the circumstance 
that they contained expressions which savoured of 
more modern doctrines. This arose from the fact, 
cc that the persons, who translated them into the 
Greek language, were men not unacquainted with 
the Grecian philosophy; and that they accordingly 
used the phraseology of the Platonic school, in set- 
ting forth doctrines originally derived from the lessons 
of Hermes." Cyril of Alexandria informs us that there 
existed an edition of the Hermaic books, entitled, 
'Epfiaixa TTsvTsxaiosxci &&u£ — (C Fifteen Books of 






SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 11 

Hermes/' It appears, indeed, that certain compo- 
sitions ascribed to Hermes, under the title of Geniea, 
or Genetic books, containing chronological compu- 
tations, were extant in the time of Eusebius, and 
even as late as that of Syncelhis. 

Besides the translations of the Hermetic books, 
the compositions of Manethon and Chasremon, who 
were both members of the priesthood, seem to have 
contained a large portion of Egyptian learning, 
transferred into the Greek language. 

But the misfortune is, that these Greek copies have 
met with the same fate that has befallen their Egyp- 
tian prototypes. The Hermetic books are wholly 
lost, unless we may except those compositions pub- 
lished by Ficinus and Patricius, under the title of 
" The Books of Hermes." Of these, a great part 
evidently originated in the pious fraud of some mis- 
taken Christians; and those which contain no un- 
doubted proof of imposture, on account of the topics 
they comprise, are of little or no value. Yet it is 
satisfactory to know that a great fund of genuine 
information respecting the antiquities of Egypt sur- 
vived long enough to afford the means of instruction 
to the writers of the ages we have before referred to. 
In the works of Diodorus, Plutarch, Macrobius, 
Porphyry, Iamblichus, Clemens, Origen, Eusebius, 
and Augustin, we find a great many fragments of 
older writers, and many pieces of the Egyptian 
philosophy, which are extremely interesting and 
instructive, provided we may rely on their genuine- 
ness; and we have no longer reason to doubt of this, 
when we find that there existed, in the age of these 
authors, sufficient means of obtaining that knowledge 
of which they appear to have been very desirous. 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

III. Some information respecting the subject of 
our inquiry may be derived from a third source, 
namely, from the doctrines and institutions of ancient 
mystics or legislators, who are well known to have 
visited Egypt before the decline of the priesthood, 
and to have introduced with them, into Europe or 
Asia, a variety of Egyptian customs or dogmas. 
Orpheus/* Pythagoras, Thales, and other founders 

* Orpheus lias indeed been called a Thracian; yet the 
learned seem to be unanimous in the opinion, that his philo- 
sophy was wholly of Egyptian origin. According to Diodorus, 
Orpheus travelled in Egypt, and there learned those tenets 
of mythology which he afterwards introduced into Greece. 
However this may have been, we have good authority for re- 
garding the fragments of the Orphic philosophy, or the Orphic 
verses, which remain to our times, as the production of the 
older Pythagoreans, rather than of Orpheus himself. We are 
now speaking of such pieces as have a title to be considered 
as genuine, having been preserved in the works of respectable 
authors. The ancients uniformly ascribe these verses to the 
Pythagorean sect, though they are not precisely agreed respect- 
ing the names of the authors. According to Ion of Chios, 
Pythagoras himself composed some of them. Sextus Empi- 
rScus attributed them to Onomacritus, a follower of Pythagoras, 
who lived at Athens in the time of the Pisistratidae. (Clemens 
Alex. Strom, lib. i.) Cercops, another Pythagorean, was suppo- 
sed by Cicero to have been the author of them. (De Nat. Deor. 
lib. i.) Others suppose that Cercops wrote a part of them. 
(Clemens, ubi supra.) Grotius has shown that the Pythago- 
reans were accustomed to attribute their own poetical compo- 
sitions on mythological subjects to Orpheus and Linus. It is 
certain that these pieces were held in great esteem among the 
Greeks, as containing the genuine doctrine of their mystical 
philosophy. Compare Clemens; Cudworth's Intellect. System, 
p. 295; Jablonski's Pantheon, lib. i. cap. 2; and Grotii Prole- 
gom. i:i Stobeei citata. 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 13 

of philosophical sects in Greece, studied, as we are 
assured, in Egypt; and they appear to have modelled 
the tenets of their respective schools on the instruc- 
tions they there received. Hence the doctrines of 
these schools may assist us, to a certain degree, in 
forming our conclusions respecting the tenets of 
the Egyptian hierarchy. 

We cannot safely avail ourselves of this resource, 
without exercising some discrimination. The Greek 
philosophers may have derived some of their doc- 
trines from other sources. They may have inter- 
mingled foreign tenets with the lessons delivered by 
the successors of Hermes. This appears to have 

The physical and metaphysical tenets, attributed more 
immediately to Pythagoras, are essentially the same with 
those contained in the Orphic fragments. God, according to 
Pythagoras, was the Soul which animated all nature, not 
extrinsic to the world, but embodied in it, as the human soul 
in the human body. From this universal soul, all the gods, 
demi-gods, as well as the souls of men and inferior animals, 
and even of plants, were emanations. Such are the accounts 
which we gather from Cicero, (Nat. Deor. lib. i. cap. 12,) 
Plutarch, (de Placitis phil.) Laertius, (lib. viii.) and others; 
from all which, Brucker concludes that the physical doctrine 
of Pythagoras scarcely differed from that afterwards adopted 
by Zeno (Brucker, Hist. Crit. Philosophise). The Stoics may 
indeed be considered as the disciples of the Pythagoreans, as 
far as respects their opinions concerning the system of nature. 

As for the Pythagorean doctrine, no doubt was ever enter- 
tained that it was purely Egyptian. Pythagoras was initiated 
in the mysteries of the Egyptians, to obtain which privilege, 
he is said to have undergone circumcision. He is reported 
to have been the disciple of Sonchedes, an Egyptian chief 
prophet, or high-priest. (Clemens Strom, lib. i.) 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

happened,, from the frequent contradictions which 
are found between the doctrines of different schools. 
We cannot therefore rely upon them as giving' a 
faithful transcript of the Egyptian philosophy. 

But there are some occasions on which we may 
with advantage avail ourselves of the instruction 
derived from this quarter. When we know, from the 
express testimony of historians,, that any particular 
dogma was prevalent among the Egyptians,, and are 
assured that it was borrowed from them by some 
foreign sect, we may apply to the latter for informa- 
tion respecting the particular mode or peculiar 
representation under which this tenet was taught in 
the Egyptian schools. It must be allowed that this 
method of inquiry is liable to some fallacies; but 
these may be avoided, if we follow its suggestions 
with sufficient caution. 

This remark may be illustrated by a particular 
example; and we cannot select abetter instance than 
the doctrine of the metempsychosis, which we know 
to have been taught by Pythagoras and his followers 
among the Greeks, and which they certainly derived 
from the Egyptians. As the Pythagoreans have left us 
a more particular account of the notions entertained 
respecting the Soul than those that we receive directly 
from the Egyptians, we may, without incurring any 
great risk of mistaking our way, take the Pythago- 
reans as our guides, in attempting to penetrate the 
sense of the Egyptian fables relating to the same 
subject. 

IV. To these three sources of information we 
venture to add a fourth, which may seem to be of 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 15 

more suspicious character; yet we may hope to derive 
from it some illustrations, of considerable value. 
We refer to the comparison of the Egyptian doc- 
trines and theological fables with those of the Indian 
Brahmans. In seeking for information in this quarter, 
we must not advance a single step without examining 
the ground on which we proceed. This is still more 
necessary than in the instances before alluded to: 
for we are informed, by the undoubted testimony of 
history, that the tenets of the Grecian schools were 
copied from the doctrines of the Hermetic colleges; 
but we have no historical information respecting any 
intercourse between the philosophers of the Nile 
and those of the Ganges, further than what results 
from internal evidence, in the resemblance of their 
tenets and representations. We shall therefore fall 
into that kind of sophism which is termed reason- 
ing in a circle, if we infer that some communica- 
tion existed between the schools of Asia and Africa, 
from the resemblance of their philosophy, and at 
the same time presume that this resemblance was 
more extensive than we can prove it to have been. 
These considerations show the necessity of proceed- 
ing in a very circumspect manner, when we attempt 
to elucidate the Egyptian fables by reference to the 
Indian mythology. We must never take for grant- 
ed any coincidence which is not clearly manifest; 
and, to avoid all ambiguity and confusion, must 
separate the inferences afforded by this comparison 
from the results of those inquiries which may appear 
to be pursued with more satisfactory evidence. With 
these precautions it will be shewn, that a very im- 
portant light may be reflected from the literature of 



16 INTRODUCTION. 

the East on the philosophy and superstition of 
Egypt, and especially on the successive develope- 
ment of doctrines, and the history of mythology in 
the latter country. 

Some authors, at the head of whom is the learned 
and ingenious Jablonski, have placed much reliance 
on the names of the Egyptian gods, and by means of 
etymologies, derived from the scanty remains of the 
Coptic language, have attempted to discriminate 
the attributes and functions of all the fabulous beings 
in the theogony. This plan seems, at the first view, 
to afford some hope of extending the narrow limits 
of our knowledge; but an attentive consideration of 
the subject tends materially to lessen any expec- 
tation we may have formed respecting it, and to 
confirm the suspicions with which etymological 
researches are generally regarded. It would appear 
that the original import of many names in the list of 
Egyptian gods had become the subject of vague 
conjecture in the time of Plutarch. This is evident,, 
from the variety of meanings assigned by authors of 
that period to a single epithet, and from the doubtful 
terms in which they offer the interpretation. Possibly 
some of these appellatives were originally derived 
from an idiom foreign to Africa, or at least to Egypt. 
But if they were all indigenous, still, as the Egyptian 
language had already undergone so great a change, 
while it was yet a living dialect, that their sense could 
only be guessed at, how can we hope to interpret 
them with any degree of certainty, by means of the 
poor remains of Coptic literature, the oldest specimens 
of which bear a date subsequent to the introduction 
of Christianity? But nothing can afford a more 



SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 17 

complete proof that these etymologies are worthy of 
no confidence than the facility with which they are 
contrived. Jablonski has experienced no difficulty 
in producing a compound appellative in the Coptic 
language, corresponding not only with every name, 
but with every fancied explanation of it that can be 
traced in the ancient writers. 

Perhaps we ought to have mentioned the remains 
of sculpture and painting, among the most valuable 
resources for illustrating the mythology of Egypt. 
This is a source which is still open, and whence we 
may hope to derive more than has yet been obtained. 
If modern researches should succeed in unfolding 
the mystery of the hieroglyphics, which seems now 
more than ever probable, the remains of sculpture 
and painting will acquire a degree of importance 
which we are not at present able to appreciate. 



BOOK THE FIRST. 

OF THE POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS, 
COMPREHENDING THEIR THEOGONY, AND THE 
FABULOUS HISTORY OF THEIR GODS. 

CHAPTER I. 

OF THE NATURE OF THE EGYPTIAN GODS IN GENERAL. 

SECTION I. 

Different Ideas respecting the Nature of the Egyptian Gods. 

The nature of the Egyptian gods, and the origin of 
those strange and absurd fictions that were connec- 
ted with them, is a subject which has engaged the 
attention of many learned and ingenious men,, 
both in ancient and modern times. Yet it must be 
allowed, that this inquiry has not led to any very 
satisfactory conclusion ; at least this would appear 
to be the case, from the variety of notions which 
have prevailed respecting the superstitious rites 
and ideas of the Egyptians. Some writers have 
been persuaded, that the religion of that ancient 
people consisted chiefly of the divine honours paid 
by them to renowned chieftains or philosophers, to 
the inventors of useful arts, or the founders of cities 
and civilized communities; others describe it as an 
idolatrous veneration of birds, beasts, fishes, and 
even plants; while a third class of authors would 
convince us that the Egyptians solely directed their 



20 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

adorations towards the sun, the moon, and other 
striking and conspicuous objects in the visible 
universe. If, as many believe, there is some truth 
in all these accounts, it is difficult to imagine what 
connection could subsist between ideas so remote 
from each other, and how they could be so combined 
as to form one system of mythology. 

The greater number of modern writers, who have 
touched upon this subject, have adopted the former 
representation respecting the fables of the Egyptians : 
they have regarded the gods of that people as deified 
heroes. It is probable that the moderns derived 
this notion from the Greek writers, with whom it 
was a familiar and certainly a very natural one, since 
it cannot be disputed that the objects of worship 
among their own countrymen, or at least a part of 
them, were originally celebrated warriors, or authors 
of useful discoveries, or the destroyers of wild beasts. 
It has been remarked also, that the Fathers of the 
Christian Church were disposed to favour this opi- 
nion, because it furnished them with a striking argu- 
ment against their Pagan adversaries. It was not 
the chief design of these pious men to inquire deeply 
into the doctrines of philosophers, or the fables of 
heathen mystics; but to expose, by a well-placed 
censure, the gross absurdities of the popular belief, 
and of rites which, whatever was their origin, only 
tended in practice to foster the most depraved 
inclinations of their devotees. 

The second representation of the Egyptian idola- 
try has furnished abundance of room for banter and 
ridicule. Accordingly, we meet with frequent allu- 
sions to it in the works of satiric writers. Juvenal 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 21 

laughs at the people whose gods grow in their gar- 
dens, and who fall prostrate in multitudes before a 
hound, while nobody cares for the goddess of the 
chace; and in the following fragment of Anaxandri- 
des, we find a specimen of the keen and humourous 
derision with which the Greeks were accustomed to 
treat the religious practices of that nation from whom 
they had originally borrowed the fables of their own 
mythology.* 

Ovx olu huvaipLrjU (rupiia-x/iv ufjuv eyco, 
oufl' of rpojroi yap ou.ovou<r outf hi vop,oi 
rjfjLcSi/j a7r aXhr\hwv hi hisyouanv ttoT^u. 

Bouts Trpocrxuvslg' syco hi &6a) rolg 6so7g' 
t5}V i'yxj-'hvv fjJyi(TTQV i\yzi hai^ova, 
r^usig hi twp o-fywv yLsyicrou Trapo. 7roAu. 

OXJX £(TQiSig VSIOL, £ym OS y TjhOfJLOll 

[xaTiKrra rovroig* kuvol (rz^eig, tv7Tto) ft eyeo, 

Totyov xarsvQiovfrav r\vii& av ha£a). 
rovg hpiag svQoloe [a,Iv oXoxT^poog vo^og 
sivoti' itolq v[LiV ft 3 wg soixev, airy pyphovg' 
<rv [A,sv tqu afaoupov xaxov zy^oVT, r)v r (hj]gj 
xkaisig' sym ftyhiirr aTroxriwag hi pay' 
hvuarat Trap up.iv [xuyaXr), it op s[ao) hi y ou. 

The following is a Translation. 

'Tis plain that you and I can ne'er agree, 
So opposite are all our ways and rites. 
Before a bull, four-legged beast, ye bend, 
With pious terror smitten: at the altar, 
I offer him a victim to the gods. 
You fancy in the little eel some power 
Of daemon huge and terrible, within 

* Anaxand. in Civitat. apud Athensei Deipnos, lib. vii. p. 299. 



22 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

We stew it for our daintiest appetite. The flesh 
Of fatted swine you touch not : 'tis the best 
Of all our delicate meats. The yelping cur 
Is in your creed a god : I whip the rogue 
Whene'er I catch him stealing eggs or meat. 
Our priests are whole in skin from foot to head : 
Not so your circumcised and shaven seers. 
You cry and wail whene'er ye spy a cat 
Starving or sick : I count it not a sin 
To hang it up, and flay it for its skin. 
Ye say the paltry shrew-mouse is a god. 



The worship of the sun and moon, and the ele- 
ments of nature, is less frequently touched upon by 
the more popular writers, partly as it was not con- 
fined to the Egyptians, and partly because it was not 
so obviously unreasonable and preposterous as the 
adoration of dead men, or dogs and cats. Yet these 
circumstances render it probable that we are to look 
in this quarter for the fundamental principles of the 
Egyptian superstitions. Among all the different 
forms of paganism, the worship of the visible ele- 
ments of nature is the most natural, and it has been 
more general than any other. Hence arises a pre- 
sumption that this was the basis of religious fables 
among the Egyptians. Indeed it was long ago ob- 
served, that we cannot imagine how the adoration 
of heroes could subsequently become connected 
with the worship of the heavenly bodies. " We 
cannot conceive how a mighty conqueror could 
become the sun ; but we can readily imagine how 
the sun, in poetic imagery or hieroglyphic painting, 
might be equipped like a hero, and at length 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 23 

worshipped as a god/'* nor is it difficult to point out 
the way by which the worship of men and of animals 
may have been derived from that superstition which 
represents all nature as animated, and pays religious 
veneration to its various parts. 

These reflections might lead us to suspect, that 
many of the stories relating to the Egyptian gods 
had their origin in figurative descriptions and 

* Nothing is more common in poetry than such a figure. 
A striking example occurs in the beginning of the Phcenissse : 

£1 frj'v h acTpoig ov^ccvou Ts^ycuv ofiov 
xcu XpVffOXOWyjfOlO'lV spGsSwg §l<$>poi$ 
HAi£, focu$ ?&moi<riv slXl(r<rcov tpXoya. 

So natural are these figures, that we find in Shakespeare 
lines which are almost a translation of the foregoing: 

" As when the golden sun salutes the morn, 
And, having gilt the ocean with his beams 
Gallops the zodiac in his glistring coach. *' 

The same imagery is found in Nonnus's poem, clothed in 
the gorgeous style that distinguishes the writers of his age : 

Aa-Tpo^Wouv Hpccxksg, avat itvpog, opyai^z xoo-pov, 
HiAts, ^poreaio tlou Soki^ocrxis itoi^v, 
lititkvuov hXiwihv oKov, KoKov ct^oin Siena:, 
vice xpovov XvytchtavtcL Suajfisxccuyvov kXl<ra"jov 
xvkXqv ctyeig psrcl kvxXqv. 

M Heracles, girt in star -bespangled robes, 
Thou fiery ruler of the spacious world ! 
Shepherd of mortals, darting far askant 
The lengthened shadow j who on high dost ride 
In circles vast the orbit of the day 3 
Rolling around, on never-ceasing wheels, 
The annual term that bears twelve waning moons." 



24: POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

allusions; but what is far more conclusive on this 
point is; that we are assured that the best-informed, * 
even among the ancient priesthood of Egypt, were 
aware that many of their external rites bore a secret 
reference to something removed from vulgar appre- 
hension, and that the fables that were related of their 
gods had originally an allegorical or recondite sense. 



SECTION II. 

Reference to the Mythologies of the Greeks and Romans. 

Even in the mythologies of the Greeks and 
Romans, and perhaps more especially in the latter, 
there are many things which the learned are nearly 
unanimous in explaining in this way; and it does not 
require a very abstruse research into the classical 
fables of antiquity, to perceive that a great part of 
their theology resolves itself into physical observa- 
tions or theories expressed in a mystical style, and 
quite different in their origin from historical tradi- 
tions; though they appear to have become, at a later 
period, so intermixed with fragments of embellished 
or poetical history, that it is very difficult to distin- 
guish these portions from each other. The chief 
objects of worship, among the ancient Greeks and 
Romans, f are explained by the most learned of 
their own antiquarians, as personifications of the 

* Plutarch, de Iside et Osiride in praefat. Origen adv. 
Celsum. lib. i. pag. 1J. lamblich. Vit. Pythagor. cap. 23. 
t Euseb. Praep. Evang. lib. iii, proem, et cap. 1. 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 25 

elements or as merely allegorical beings. Such 
obviously was Minerva, or Wisdom, who sprang 
from the head of Jupiter. Vesta, according to Ovid, 
was fire, the animating principle of nature. 

(i Nee tu aliud Vestam quam vivam intellige flammam."* 

" Nor deem thou Vesta other than the flame 
" Of living, lambent fire." 

But Euripides interprets Vesta as the earth. 

XOU ToUOL [JLTJTSp' JL(TtI<XV &£ <T 01 <TQ$oi 
GpOTWV XOLhQXHT iV 3 ^BV7]V SV OllQspl.f 

" Thou mother Earth, whom wisest men proclaim^ 
" Vesta, self-poised in circumambient air." 

Jupiter is allowed by all to have been the visible 
firmament personified. As such, he is described in 
the following beautiful lines of Euripides ;J 

(ypoLg tov u-fyou tov $ a.7rsipov alQipa. 

xa) yijv 7repi% £%ovfl c uypoiig h ayxaXutg, 

toutov vqjj.i%£ Zt\vol } tov $ r^you deait. 

" Behold on high the etherial element 

" Boundless, upholding in its watery arms 

<f On every side out-stretched, this earthly globe; 

<s Such deem the mighty Jove, thy king, thy god*" 

* Ovid. Fasti. 6. 

f Fragm. ex incert. Tragced. citat. apud Macrob. Saturnal. 
lib. i. cap. 23. 

t Eurip. Fragment, Cressarum. 

E 



26 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

The same idea is conveyed hi a well-known verse 
of Ennius, quoted by Cicero : 

* Aspice hoc sublime caudens, quern invocant omnes Jovem." 

Accordingly,, the thunderbolt was wielded by the 
hand of Jupiter, and, as ruler of storms and showers, 
he received the titles of O^piog and Pluvius* He is 
represented as having his seat on the cloud-capped 
summit of a mountain, Ida or Olympus, or as ruling 
aloft in the air. 

Ops, the wife of Saturn, according to Macrobius, 
was the Earth. f Saturn himself, as his name indi- 
cates, was the Sowing of seed which fertilizes the 
Earth, and causes her to produce her offspring. Such 
was the description of Ops, or Fatua, in the Ponti- 
fical books; and, as representing the Earth, she was 
adored with the sacrifice of a pregnant sow. The 
Grecian Cronus, who differed from the Roman 
Saturn, represented, according to an old interpreta- 
tion which we owe to the same author, Time, or 
that portion of eternity and of boundless space in 
which the existence of the present limited sphere is 
included. Cronus was begotten of Uranus, the 
infinite Heaven. He emasculated his sire; and the 
birth of Aphrodite, the goddess of propagation, was 
connected with this exploit. By this fable, says 
Macrobius, the ancient mystics meant to indicate, 
that, after the finite world was completed in all its 
parts, the productive or creative influences which 
had descended from the heavens on the earth and had 
called forth new creatures into being, were cut off, 

* Tibull. lib. i. eleg. vii. v. 2&. f Macrob. Saturnal. lib. i. 



NATURE OP THE GODS. 27 

or entirely ceased ; and that the maintenance of ani- 
mal and vegetable nature was thenceforth supported 
by another method, viz. by that of propagation. 
This learned author always prefers physical expla- 
nations of the fables of the Greek and Roman my- 
thology; and Varro, whom Cicero and St. Augustin* 
regard as the most profound of the Roman antiqua- 
rians, refers the Latin deities of the first order, such 
as Jupiter, Juno, Saturn, Vulcan, and Proserpine, 
to the elements or departments of the world. f 



SECTION III. 

Testimonies of the Ancient Writers respecting the Egyptian 
Mythology in general. 

But if this method of interpreting has any appli- 
cation to the fables of the Greeks and Romans, it 
stands on a much firmer ground when applied to 
the mythologies and superstitious practices of the 
Egyptians. Indeed the most intelligent of the ancient 
writers, who have alluded to this subject, have assured 
us that the principal objects of Egyptian worship 
were those physical agents, whose operative energy is 
the most conspicuous in the phaenomena of nature. J 

In the several nomes or provinces of Egypt, pe- 
culiar religious customs were established, and the 

* St. Augustin. Civit. Dei. lib. vi. cap. 2. See Vossius de 
Origine et Progressu Idolotatriae, lib. ii. where that writer has 
collected a great number of authorities on this subject. 

f See Varro de Lingua Latina, lib. iv. ubi de coelestibu* 
agitur. 

X See Commentary on Chap. 1, Note A. 



28 EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN GENERAL. 

natives of each directed their devotions to particular 
deities.* But besides these separate superstitions,, 
which however were all conceived in the same spirit, 
and, like the worship of favourite saints among the 
Roman Catholics, had more or less of relation to a 
connected system, the whole Egyptian people par- 
ticipated in the rites of Isis and Osiris, to which we 
may add those of Serapis, who, under a particular 
character, was identified with Osiris. The worship 
of these deities has been always regarded as the 
national religion of Egypt. f Let us observe in what 
manner the ancient writers speak of it. 

" The first generation of men in Egypt/' says 
Diodorus, cc contemplating the beauty of the superior 
world, and admiring with astonishment the frame 
and order of the universe, supposed that there were 
two chief gods that were eternal, that is to say, the 
Sun and the Moon, the first of which they called 
Osiris, and the other, Isis, both names having proper 
etymologies; for Osiris, in the Greek language, 
signifies a thing with many eyes, which may be very 
properly applied to the sun, darting his rays into 
every corner, and, as it were, with so many eyes 
viewing and surveying the whole land and sea; 
with which the poet agrees, who says, 

u Riding on high, the Sun all sees and hears." 

Some also of the ancient Greek mythologists call 
Osiris, Dionysius, and surname him Sirius, amongst 
whom Eumolpus, in his Bacchanal verses, 

* Herodotus, lib. ii. Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. 
t Accordingly Plutarch entitled his essay on the religion of 
Egypt, <c Hspi l(ri$6$ koli 0<riQ&os" 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 29 

" Dionysius darts his fiery rays. 

And Orpheus,, 

" He is called Phanetes and Dionysius." 

Some likewise set him forth clothed with the spotted 
skin of a fawn (called Nebris), from the variety 
of stars that surround him. Isis likewise,, being 
interpreted, signifies ancient, that name being as- 
cribed to the Moon from eternal generations. They 
add likewise horns to her, because her aspect is 
such in her increase, and in her decrease, represent- 
ing a sickle ; and because an ox, among the Egyp- 
tians, is offered to her in sacrifice. They hold that 
these gods govern the whole world, cherishing and 
increasing all things; and divide the year into three 
parts, viz. spring, summer, and winter, by an invi- 
sible motion, perfecting their constant course in that 
time; and though they are in their natures very 
different one from another, yet they complete the 
whole year with a most excellent harmony and con- 
sent. They say that these gods in their natures 
contribute much to the generation of all things, the 
one being of a hot and active nature, the other 
moist and cold, but both having something of the 
air; and that by these all things are both brought 
forth and nourished; and therefore that every 
particular being in the universe is perfected and 
completed by the Sun and Moon, whose qualities as 
before declared are five; a spirit or quickening 
efficacy, heat or fire, dryness or earth, moisture or 
water, and air, of which the world consists, as a man 
is made up of head, hands, feet, and other parts/' 



30 EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN GENERAL. 

" These five objects were regarded as gods, and the 
people of Egypt, who first possessed an articulate 
language, gave names to each of them in their own 
dialect. They termed the spirit, or animating ether, 
Jupiter; fire, Vulcan; the earth, Demeter or Ceres; 
water, Ocean us; and the air, Minerva or Tritogenia.*" 

Macrobius gives us the same general idea, of the 
Egyptian superstition. He says, c( It is well known 
that Osiris is the sun, and Isis the earth, or nature in 
general/'* {C Hence the Egyptians represent Osiris 
in their hieroglyphics by the figure of a sceptre con- 
taining an eye; by which they indicate that this god 
is the sun, and that he looks down from on high, like 
a monarch, on the sublunary world/' Hence also, as 
the same author observes in another place, the images 
of Isis were formed with many breasts, indicating 
that Nature is the universal nurse, nourishing from 
her bosom an infinite and various progeny. 

But a still more explicit testimony is that of Cha> 
remon, one of the sacred scribes, an order which held 
a very dignified rank in the Egyptian priesthood, as 
the sole depositories of ancient learning. Porphyry, 
in his epistle to the priest Annebon, which contains 
a number of inquiries respecting the secret sense of 
the Egyptian mythology, has given a summary of the 
doctrine of Chaeremon. The following is a transla- 
tion of the passage that contains it. 

" I wish to be informed/' says Porphyry, cc what 
opinion the Egyptians entertain concerning the first 

* Diodorus, translated by Booth, Book I. 

f Nee in occulto est, neque aliud esse Osirin quam solem, nee 
Isin aliud esse quam terram, naturamve rerum. — Saturnalia, 
lib. i. 



NATURE OF THE GODS. SI 

cause ; whether they conceive it to be intellect, or 
something distinct from intellect." ff For Chaeremon 
and others acknowledge nothing anterior to the visi- 
ble worlds, taking the gods of the Egyptians as the 
foundation of their reasonings,* and acknowledging 
no other deities than the planets and the asterisms of 
the Zodiac with their paranatellons, the subdivisions 
of the signs called Decani, and Horoscopes, and 
those stars termed mighty chiefs, the names of which 
are inserted in the almanacks, together with their 
supposed influence in curing diseases, and the prog- 
nostics that were drawn from their risings and set- 
tings. For he observed that those Egyptians, who 
considered the Sun as the demiurge or creator, also 
referred the adventures of Osiris and Isis, and all the 
sacred fables, to the stars and their appearances, their 
settings and risings, or to the increases and w r anings 
of the moon, or to the journey of the sun in the noc- 
turnal or diurnal hemisphere, or to the river Nile; 
and in general that they give all their mythologues a 
physical explanation, and refer none of them to spi- 
ritual or living beings." He adds, that most of these 
persons connected human affairs with the motions of 
the stars, binding all things in the indissoluble chains 
of necessity, which they term fate, and making them 
depend on the divinities abovementioned, whom they 
revere in temples, and by means of statues and in 
other methods, as the only beings who have power 
over destiny, f 

* The original passage is here manifestly corrupt: I have 
endeavoured to give the sense with as little alteration in the 
text as possible. 

f Epist. Porphyrii pr&miss. lamblich. de Myster. /Egypt. 



32 EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN GENERAL. 

The opinion of Chseremon is cited by Eusebius, 
in his Evangelical Preparation; and that learned 
author concludes from it that the Egyptian theology, 
even in its recondite and isoteric sense, which was so 
much boasted of by the philosophers, referred to no 
other objects of worship than the stars and planets, 
and recognized or incorporeal principle, no invisi- 
ble intelligence, as the productive cause of the 
universe.* The same passage has been cited by 
some authors of more recent date, whose object it 
has been to give a degrading picture of the science 
and learning of ancient Egypt.f In opposition to 
such writers, Dr. Cud worth, the strenuous advocate 
of the wisdom of antiquity, has adduced the tes- 
timony of Iamblichus, who, under the fictitious 
name of Abammon, has replied to the inquiries con- 
tained in the letter of Porphyry. J The following is 
a translation of the passage of Iamblichus, in which 
the opinion of Chagremon is alluded to. 

" Chaeremon, and some others who treat of the 
first causes of the phenomena of the world, enume- 
rate in reality only the lowest principles ; and those 
writers who mention the planets, the zodiac, and 
the decans and horoscopes, and the stars termed 
mighty chiefs, confine themselves to particular 
departments of the productive causes. Such topics 

* Eusebius. Evan. Praep. lib. iii. cap. iv. 

f Dr. Cudworth's Intellectual System. 

J Chaeremon is also much extolled by Dupuis, who re- 
peatedly cites his evidence, in order to prove that the idea of 
an intelligent and spiritual cause is a fiction of modern times, 
and that the philosophers of the ancient world were too wise 
to indulge in any such absurd reverie. 



EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN GENERAL. S3 

indeed as are contained in the almanacks,, constitute 
but a very small part of the institutions of Hermes ; 
and all that relates to the apparitions or occultations 
of the stars, or the increasings or wanings of the 
Moon, has the lowest place in the Egyptian doctrine 
of causes. Nor do the Egyptians resolve all things 
into physical qualities ; but they distinguish both the 
animal and intellectual life from nature itself, not 
only in the universe, but in man. They consider 
intellect and reason, in the first place,, as existing by 
themselves, and on this principle they account for 
the creation of the world." In the sentence which 
immediately follows, and of which Dr. Cudworth has 
taken no notice, lamblichus proceeds to give this 
doctrine a form more consistent with other repre- 
sentations of the Egyptian philosophy. After ob- 
serving that ic they rank first the Demiurgus as the 
first parent of all things that are produced, and 
acknowledge that vital energy which is prior to, 
and subsists in the heavens, and place pure intellect 
at the head of the universe/' he adds, that they 
iC allot one invisible soul to the whole world, and 
another divided one to all the spheres/'* 

If we attentively consider this passage of lambli- 
chus, and divest it of the jargon of the later Platonic 
school, with which that author himself informs us 
that the Egyptians, who wrote after the Ptolemaic 
age, were accustomed to clothe the doctrines of 
Hermes or the native philosophy of Egypt, we shall 
find that it may easily be reconciled with the tenour 
of the evidence before adduced. By comparing 

* lamblichus de Mysteriis iEgyptiorum^ sect. viii. cap. iv. 



34 NATURE OF THE GODS. 

all that the ancients have left, concerning the 
superstitions of the Egyptians, we learn that the 
worship of that nation was directed towards physical 
objects, or the departments and powers of nature. 
It may be questioned whether the people had any 
exalted idea of the invisible author, as distinguished 
from his works. On the other hand, it is equally 
repugnant to reason, and to the testimonies of the 
ancient writers, to suppose that they paid adoration 
to inanimate bodies, regarding them as such. ei This," 
says Dr. Cudworth, <c would be a sottishness, and 
contradictious nonsense, that is not incidental to 
human nature." The Egyptians, as Iamblichus as- 
serts in the passage above quoted, considered every 
part of the visible universe as endowed with an 
inherent life, energy, and intelligence ; they wor- 
shipped the intelligent and active cause of the phe- 
nomena of nature, as it is displayed in its most 
striking and powerful agencies, but, as we shall 
hereafter find reason to conclude, without accurately 
discriminating the cause from the effect; or they 
believed, as men seem naturally prone to imagine, 
that the elements themselves were animated. 
<c Such," says Eusebius, " was the doctrine of the 
Egyptians, from whom Orpheus deriving his theology, 
represented the universe as a god, formed or com- 
posed of a number of subordinate divinities as inte- 
grant parts of himself; for we have already shown," 
he adds, " that the Egyptians reckoned the depart- 
ments of the world itself as gods."* The opera- 
tions of the elements, described in a mystical 

* Euseb. Evan. Praep. lib. iii. cap. ix. 






EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN GENERAL. 35 

and poetical style, were perhaps mistaken, by 
the vulgar, for the adventures of gods or daemons ; 
but the original sense of these theogonical fables 
would appear to have been merely physical, or 
founded on that species of paganism which Euse- 
bius declares to be the most ancient, namely, the 
worship of nature.* Barbarous nations have ever 
regarded storms, winds, and the moving bodies in the 
heavens, as animated and guided by genii ; and the 
same superstition, decorated and reduced to a system 
of mystical representations, appears to have been the 
popular religion of the most cultivated nations of 
antiquity. 

* Varro affirmed that the forms, decorations, and whole 
attributes of the gods, were invented as sensible representa- 
tions, in which men might contemplate and revere the truegods. 
These, according to him, were the soul of the world, and its 
parts, which were distributed to the heaven, earth, air, sky, 
land, water. See St. Augustin. de Civit. Dei, lib. vii. c. 5 
and 6. 

But, besides these physical deities, Varro enumerated a series 
of gods, or daemons, who presided over all the acts of a man's 
life, even the most trivial, from Janus, who ushered him into 
the world, to Naenia, the goddess of the songs recited at old 
men's funerals. Ibid. cap. ix. lib. 6. 



36 NATURE OF THE GODS. 



SECTION IV. 



Attempt to penetrate farther into the Meaning of the 
Egyptian Fables. Analysis of the Orphic Fictions, and 
other Mystical Representations derived from Egypt. 

Such is the general view which the ancients give 
us of the religion of the Egyptians; and thus far we 
advance on tolerably safe ground, because the evi- 
dence on which we rely is nearly unanimous. But 
when we attempt to proceed further, and to analyse 
the particular portions of this intricate system of 
mythology, we find the sources of our information 
extremely defective. It seems too probable that 
before the time of the Greek writers, who have given 
us the most extensive discourses on these topics, 
the interpretation of many allegorical fictions was 
either wholly lost, or had become the subject of 
doubtful speculation. Hecataeusand Herodotus, who 
travelled in Egypt during the period when its native 
hierarchy still flourished, saw only the outward form 
of its mythology, or have studiously concealed their 
knowledge of its recondite sense. It is only through 
the medium of the doctrines of the Pythagoreans and 
the followers of Thales, and the older philosophy of 
Orpheus, which were the lessons of the initiated, 
that we can hope to penetrate the veil of Egyptian 
mystery, and become acquainted with the dogmas 
that were delivered in secret to the pupils of the 
thrice-great Hermes. 

The Orphic fragments contain the oldest speci- 
mens of the sacerdotal philosophy of the Greeks, or 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 37 

of those mystical interpretations of the popular super- 
stition which were preserved among 1 the hierophants, 
who transplanted the worship of the gods from the 
banks of the Nile to the hamlets of Argos and Attica. 
It probably received corrections and additions,, from 
time to time, from learned Greeks who travelled into 
the East, and studied in the Egyptian schools. The 
Orphic verses themselves were chiefly the works of 
Pythagoreans. They contain that representation of 
the system of the world which has been termed Pan- 
theism, declaring all the departments of nature to be 
animated by living powers, which are portions of the 
supreme or universal soul, into whose essence all 
finite beings are resolved. Sometimes the entire 
universe is represented as one great living whole ; at 
others, its parts are spoken of as having an indivi- 
dual nature, which has emanated from and will again 
be resolved into the universal being. The former of 
these ideas is conveyed by the following verses cited 
by Eusebius from the works of Porphyry.* 

Zsvg 7ruflja^v yatys ts xa) oupavou a(rrsp6suros' 

Zsvg 7t6vtov p?£a, Zsvg r\\iog tJSs (rzhrprf 

cv xpaTog, slg Sa/juwov ysvsro, [jusyas fyxpS a7raVTOiV 3 

SU &£ §S[AOLS SoMTlXglOV, SV (6 TOt^S TtOVTa XUX'hSlTai, 

7ruf) xa) uficop xa) yaia xa) aiSyp, v6{£ rs xa) Tjfxap' 
{xa) MrJTiSs wpwros ysvsrcop, xa) Epa>£ 7ru7^ursp7r^s) 
7T0LUT0L yap h Ztjvos [xsyaT^co rafts ara)[Aari xs7rar 
rou §yjtoi xsfyaT^v jasv ISsTv xa) xaT^a 7rp6<ra)7ra 
oupavos a\y'hr\sis> ov xpixrsal ajJt$i£ hQsipai 
dcrrpcou pap^apsaiV irspixaXhsss yspsQovrai. 

Procl. in Tim. p. 95. Euseb. Prsep. Evang* 



38 NATURE OF THE GODS. 

" Jupiter is the foundation of the earth and the 
starry heaven : Jupiter is the root of the ocean ; he 
is the sun and the moon: He is one power, one 
daemon, the great ruler of all. He is one mighty 
body, in which fire, water, earth, ether, night and 
day revolve: all these are contained within the great 
body of Jupiter. Would you view his head and 
majestic face? Behold the radiant heaven: his 
golden ringlets are diffused on every side, shining 
with resplendent stars." 

Similar ideas are contained in the following lines, 
preserved by Proclus, in his Commentary upon the 
Timaeus.* 

Touvzxa (rbv rep 7ravri Aiog irahiv svrog sr6^Qr} 
aiQspog 1 eupei7)£, tJ8 ovpavov ayT^aov tyog, 
7T0VT0U 8* arpuyirox), ycdr\g K IpixvMog evprj, 
wxsavog rs [xiyag, xcCi vkiara raprapa yair\g 

7COU 7r0T0tjU,Q}_, XOLl 7T0VT0g OLTZipiTOg, OLTO^OL T£ TTOLVrOL, 

7rou/Tsg K aOamroi [xaxapeg Oso), 7$e Qeaivai, 
occtol o° %r\v ysyawra, xat vrrrspov hirirhfr JjU,sXAsv 
eyyevsro' Zyvog S' h\ yacrrspi cruppa 7re<p6x£i. 

€e The splendid lights of that etherial vault, 
The empyrean and the nether sky, 
The barren sea, and wide-spread continents 
Supporting stately realms, the ocean vast, 
The depths of Tartarus, and boundless lakes j 
The mighty rivers ; all that earth contains, 
With all the immortal host, the goddesses 
And gods, and all that was or e'er shall be — 
All these have grown and are contained within 
The all-teeming womb of universal Jove." 

* Procl. in Timaeum, 2, p. 95, 34. Gesner's Orphica, 
p. 365. 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 39 

The idea of emanations from the universal soul 
animating bodies of various kinds, occurs in the 
works of several poets, in which fragments of the 
old Orphic doctrine are scattered. It is beautifully 
expressed by Virgil, who was deeply versed in the 
philosophy of the ancients. 

Principio coelum ac terras, camposque liquentes, 
Lucentemque globum luna5, Titaniaque astra, 
Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus 
Mens agitat molem, et magno se eorpore miscet. 
Inde hominum pecudumque genus, viteeque volantum 
Et quae marmoreo fert monstra sub sequore pontus.* 



" Know first, that heaven and earth's compacted frame, 
And flowing waters, and the starry flame, 
And both the radiant lights, one common soul, 
Inspires, and feeds, and animates the whole. 
This active mind, infused through all the space, 
Unites and mingles in the common mass. 
Hence men and beasts the breath of life obtain, 
And birds of air and monsters of the main."f 

All individual beings were represented as pro- 
ceeding from the essence of the universal deity by a 
mystical generation, which is described under various 
types. Sometimes Jupiter is feigned to be both male 
and female, and is said to produce all things from 
himself. 

Zsug 7rpu>Tog ysvsro, Zsug ucrarog ap%ixspuuvog 
Zsug «£(paXrj, Zsug psarara, Aiog- $ ex 7ravra rsruxrar 
Zsug aptr^j yiusro, Zsug dpSporog sttXsto VL^upTj.* 

* Virgil. ^Eneid, lib. vi. ver. 721. f Dryden's Virgil. 



40 NATURE OF THE GODS. 

u Jupiter is the first, Jupiter the last, the ruler 
of thunder ; Jupiter is the head and the middle ; 
all things are produced of Jove. Jupiter is a male, 
Jupiter is an immortal nymph/' 

Hence the epithet, so often given to Jupiter, of 
ap(revo6ri'hbg y or masculo-feminine. The doctrine 
distinguished by this epithet is represented,, by 
Damascius, as the fundamental principle of the 
Orphic philosophy. 

But the most prevalent representation was that 
which divided the physical agencies of the universe 
into male and female.* The more powerful move- 
ments of the elements., storms and winds,, thunder 
and lightning, meteors., the genial showers which 
descend from the etherial regions on the bosom of 
the Earth, the rays of the sun, and the supposed in- 
fluences of the stars, were the energetic or masculine 
powers of nature, and were regarded as the agencies 
of the male deity; while the prolific Earth herself, the 
region of sublunary and passive elements, was the 
universal goddess, the consort of the celestial Jove. 
This is the celebrated fiction of the mystic marriage 
of heaven and earth, which forms the foundation of 
all the pagan cosmogonies and poetical rhapsodies on 
the origin of gods and men. It is given by Virgil in 
its most obvious physical sense, and it is observed by 

* Vossius has observed that this idea holds a principal place 
in the mythology of the ancients. He says, " In natura at- 
tendentes vim activam et passivam, earn et marem et foeminam 
dixere; marem illud, quod vim in alia exserit; foeminam, 
quae vim alienam recipit, et quasi foecundatur."— • Vossius de 
Origine et Progressu Idololatriae, lib, u 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 41 

St. Augustin, that this representation is not borrowed 
from the fictions of poetry, but from the philosophy 
of the antients. 

Vere tument terrse, et genitalia semina poscunt ; 
Turn pater omnipotens foecundis imbribus iEther ; 
Conjugis in gremium lsetse descendit, et omnes 
Magnus alit, magno commistus corpore, foetus.* 

In writing these verses, we may conjecture that 
Virgil had in his memory the following lines of 
Euripides, which express the same idea in very 
similar terms : 

spa K b crs^vog Oupavog, ir^fipoi^svog 
o[A,£pou Trsarsiv slg YolIolv, Atypohlrrig v7ro.\ 

Or the following verses of Lucretius : 

Postremo pereunt imbres ubi eos Pater ^Ether, 
In gremium Matris Terrai prsecipitavit.J 

This physical allegory is expressed by some of 
the philosophical writers in a more formal manner. 
?' Ut a sum mis causis exordiamur/' says Proclus^ 
ff Ccelum et Terram quasi marem et fceminam res- 
picere licet. Est enim Cceli motus qui ex diurna 
revolution e vires seminales edit, unde Terra qua? 
emanant recipit. Haec feracem reddunt et efficit ut 
fructus et animalia omnigena ex se producat." The 
same author observes, that this supposed relation was 

* Georgic. lib. ii. ver. 324. f Fragment. CEdip. 

I De Rerum Natura, lib. i. ver. 251. See also Dr. Musgrave's 
Dissertation on the Grecian Mythology, p. 20. 



42 NATURE OF THE GODS. 

termed, in the mystical language, cc yapog" and that 
the Athenian laws ordained accordingly, that newly 
married persons should sacrifice first to the Heaven 
and Earth, and that in the mysteries of Eleusis these 
elements were invoked and addressed by names, 
which characterised them as father and mother of all 
generated beings: these mystic names were uisg for 
the Heaven, and roxma for the Earth.* 

Varro has given a similar account of the ancient 
mythology in general. " Principes Dei, Coelum et 
Terra. Hi dei iidem qui in iEgypto Serapis et Isis; 
qui sunt Taautes et Astarte apud Phcenicas ; et iidem 
principes in Latio, Saturnus et Ops/'f 

Apollodorus* and Plutarch§ deliver the same testi- 
mony. The latter of these writers remarks, that men, 
from observing the harmonious phaenomena of the 
heavens, as well as the generation of plants and 
animals upon the earth, came to regard the Heaven 
as the Father of all, and the Earth as the Mother — 
<c tovtcov Ss 6 jasv Oupavbg, war7\p 3 hik to rag r&v u^arwu 
Ixyyasig (nrspixarayu £"XJ=w ra^iv, 73 $e Tij ^Trip, hioL to 
§s%s<r$a,i rarira xoCi tixtsiv." 

Macrobius attributes this representation to the 
philosophers of the Platonic school. " Some wri- 
ters/' he observes, " have divided the world into 
two regions, of which one is active, the other passive 
nature. The first they term active, because, being 
immutable itself, it brings into operation those 
causes which necessarily excite changes in the other; 

* Procl. in Timaeum. lib. v. p. 291. 

f Varro de Ling. Lat. lib. iv. 

% Apollodorus in initio. 

§ Plutarch, de Placitis Philosoph. lib. i. cap. 6. 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 43 

the latter is called passive, because it undergoes 
variations in its state. The immutable region of 
the world extends from the sphere termed Aplanes 
to the orbit of the Moon ; the mutable department, 
from the lunar orbit to the earth/'* This fiction 
was derived by the Platonists from their predeces- 
sors, the Pythagoreans. It is found indeed in a still 
more explicit form, in the works of Ocellus Lucanus, 
the Pythagorean, f 

In the Samothracian mysteries, which seem to have 
been the most anciently established ceremonies of 
this kind in Europe, we are informed by Varro, that 
the Heaven and Earth were worshipped as a male 
and female divinity, and as the parents of all things. 
A well-known part of the ceremonies, performed in 
these and other mystic solemnities, were the rites of 
the phallus and kteis ;% and Diodorus assures us that 
the physical theory above described was the subject 
typified by these emblems. 

The same idea occurs frequently in the Greek 
poets. Euripides, who has embodied in his poems 
many curious pieces of the mystical allegory of the 
ancients, has set it forth emphatically in the following 
lines.§ 

TcCia fjLsyl(TT7} f xou Siog 'AiSS^p, 
O joisv avQpd)7ra)V xou fiscov ysverwp, 

* Macrobii Somnium Scipionis, lib. i. cap. 11. 

f Ocellus Lucanus. See also the Commentary on Chapter I. 5 
Note B., below. 

X The same symbol was used in the festivals of Ceres and 
Proserpine in Sicily, as we learn from Athenseus, lib. xxv. 

§ Fragment. Chrysippi. apud Macrob. Sat. lib. i. 



44 NATURE OF THE GOD». 

tJ(T vypoQohovg (rrayovag vorioug 
wa,pa$s{;a[Aiv7i, rixrsi Guarou? 
rlxTsi os Gopav, <puAa re SrjpaJV 
ofisv ovx o&ixcog 
[M\Tr\p TraVTOM uevo^ifrrat. 

O spacious Earth ! and thou, celestial Air, 
Who art the sire of gods and mortal men ! 
While she, the ambrosial mother, doth receive 
The genial showers on her expanded breast, 
Teeming with human offspring, and brings forth 
The aliment of life, and all the tribes 
That roam the forest 3 justly thence proclaimed 
Mother of all. 

The Sun being the most striking of the celestial 
elements, the male power was adored as residing and 
manifesting its most energetic influence in the splar 
orb. In those representations connected with the ido- 
latry of the Syrians, which, as we shall see hereafter, 
was nearly allied to the fables of Egypt, we find the 
worship of the Sun involved in the figurative theology 
which we have already traced. Macrobius gives us 
the following account of the notions entertained by 
the Syrians, or Assyrians, concerning the power of 
the solar deity, t( They give/' he observes, " the 
name of Adad, which signifies One, to the god on 
whom they bestow the highest adoration. They 
worship him as the most powerful divinity, but join 
with him a goddess named Adargatis; and to these 
two deities, which are in fact the Sun and Moon, they 
ascribe supreme dominion over all nature. The at- 
tributes of this double divinity are not described in 
so many words ; but, in symbols which are used to 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 45 

denote that power that distributes itself through all 
the species of beings that exist. These symbols are 
emblematic of the Sun ; for the image of Adad is 
distinguished by rays inclining downwards,, which 
indicate that the influence of the heaven descends by 
the solar rays upon the earth ; the image of Adar- 
gatis has the rays turned upward s, to show that all 
the progeny of the earth is called into being by the 
influence of emanations from above." 

Thus in the Orphic verses the title of Zeus, or 
Jupiter, which we have seen appropriated to the 
universal deity in these poems, is applied, in other 
fragments, to the god of the solar orb,* who is ad- 
dressed with the pantheistic epithets ; as in the fol- 
lowing verses cited by Macrobius. 

oupoLvicug (rTf>o<poLhiy{~i 7rspt$po[JLOV aWv e.'hi<r(raiV 
ayAas Zsu, Aiovuars, irarep 7rovrou } Trarsp anj£, 
H?U£ Trayysvirop, iravaioKs, %pv<r£Q<f>syys£. 

" O thou who whirlest thy radiant globe, rolling 
on celestial wheels, through the spacious vortex of 
heaven ! glorious Jupiter ! Dionusus, father of the sea 
and of the land ! thou Sun ! who art the genial parent 

* The Sun is often described as the God who fertilises the 
sublunary world. O y\io$ (ntEppaiveiv Xsyarou tyy <£wfv says 
Eusebius.* " The Sun is said to render nature prolific/' 
Macrobius asserts the same thing. " Deus hie inseminat, 
progenerat, fovit, nutrit, maturatque."f 

* Euseb. P. Evang. lib. iii. c. xiii. f Macrob. Saturnal. lib. i. 
cap. xxvii. 



46 NATURE OF THE GODS. 

of Nature^ splendent with various hues, shedding 
streams of golden light !" 

The active power, as residing in the Sun, is in- 
voked under the name of Dionusus, or Liber. Thus 
Virgil. 

Vos O clarissima mundi 
Lumina, labentem coelo qui ducrtis annum, 
Liber et alma Ceres. 

But it was in the rites of the same Liber that the 
mystical generation was celebrated ; and he is conti- 
nually identified with the Pantheistic Jove, in the 
mythological poems of the Greeks, as in the follow- 
ing verse, which expresses the sense of an oracle 
uttered from the shrine of Apollo Clarius. 

dig Zebg, eig 'A&7j£, eig HXiog, eig AtovuG'og* 

In referring to the first origin of all things, the 
same fiction was resorted to by the old mythologists 
of Greece ; and Proclus has remarked that it lies at 
the foundation of all the ancient theogonies. Uranus 
and Ge, the Heaven and the Earth, were, according 
to Hesiod, the parents of all creatures. The Gods 
were the eldest of their progeny. 

The celebrated Phoenician theogony of Sancho- 
niatho is founded on the same principles. Heaven 
and Earth, Uranus and Ge, whom some writers 
have ridiculously transformed into Noah and his 
Wife, are at the head of a genealogy of iEons, whose 

* Procl. in Timaeum. Gesner's Orphica. 



ANALYSIS OF THE ORPHIC FABLES. 47 

adventures are conceived in the mystical style of 
these physical allegorists. 

Several fragments remain of the old Orphic cos- 
mogony,, which abound with ideas of the same de- 
scription. But we shall hereafter proceed to notice 
the theories of the Orphic as well as of the Egyptian 
philosophers,, with reference to the first origin of the 
world. At present we are only considering those 
poetical fictions relating to the actual phaenomena 
of nature, as connected with the annual returns of 
the seasons, which were celebrated by the rhapsodies 
of Greeks and Barbarians ; and which, as we shall 
presently observe, were the chief objects of those 
fantastic superstitions that were carried on with 
so much pomp and revelry on the banks of the 
Nile. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER I. 



NOTE A. to Sect. I. 

The opinion, that the gods of the ancient Egyptians, and 
the deities of the Pagan world in general, were originally 
T\ deified mortals, has been very prevalent among Christian 
writers. This hypothesis has been maintained, chiefly with 
relation to the Egyptians, by Bishop Warburton, in his De- 
monstration of the Divine Legation of Moses. 

The principal reliance of Warburton, in the prosecution of 
this argument, is placed on two passages from the ancient 
writers, which seem indeed to afford a very specious support to 
his conclusion. One of them is a citation from Cicero's 
Tusculan Questions, in which the author clearly affirms 
that many mortals had been reckoned among the celestial 
powers ; and that, according to some ancient Greek writers, 
even the great gods, the " Dii majorum gentium," were of 
this number. It is also intimated that something to this effect 
was taught, or might be inferred from the mysteries.* 

In order to elude the application of this testimony to the 
gods of Egypt, Jablonski has maintained that there was little 
or no connection between the superstitions that prevailed in 
that country, and those of the Greeks ;f that the mysteries 
of the two nations were altogether distinct; but in this 
instance, he has directly against him the authority of all anti- 
quity, and particularly that of Herodotus, who plainly asserts 
that the names and offices of nearly all the Grecian gods were 
of Egyptian origin. J 

* Tusc. Disp. lib. i. cap. 13. 

f Jablonski Pantheon ^Egypt. Prolegom. $ Herod- lib. ii. 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 49 

This testimony, from such a writer as Herodotus, is not to 
be disputed : but we may observe that it does not appear to be 
necessarily connected with the inference which Warburton has 
founded upon it. It may well be imagined that the rites and 
attributes, and even many of the names, of the Grecian gods, 
may have been originally derived from a mythology, founded 
on very different principles from the deification of men ; yet 
that they may have become subsequently associated with the 
memory of celebrated warriours, or the worship of heroes. 
We find nearly a parallel instance in the history of the northern 
nations. The first Odin was an ancient god of the Gothic 
tribes before the era of their emigration from the wilds of 
Scythia. There are many circumstances which render it 
probable that he was the Indian Buddha, who is still adored by 
the roving nations of northern Asia, from China to the Caspian 
sea. But the Scandinavian hero, whose adventures are cele- 
brated in the Edda, was a chieftain who lived at a compara- 
tively late period, and who seems to have assumed the name 
of the god, in order to facilitate his conquests, and secure the 
veneration of his people.* 

In like manner it would appear that the Egyptian priests, 
who introduced into Greece the worship of each particular 
divinity, found it expedient, in order to facilitate the recep- 
tion of foreign rites, to connect the object of their worship 
with some local traditions, and to engraft their allegorical 
mythologue on the legend of some chieftain, whose barbarian 
achievements were already the theme of popular song. It was 
probably in this way that the rites of Ammon, who was wor- 
shipped at Diospolis under the form of a ram, or of a statue 
with a ram's head, became identified with Zeus, a king of 
Crete, whose tomb was long afterwards to be seen on mount 
Ida. It was perhaps thus that the attributes of Bacchus or 
Osiris, which were older by many centuries than the founda- 
tion of the Cadmeian Thebes, came to be ascribed to a Boeotian 
prince, who was celebrated as the leader of festive mirth. 

* See Mallet's Northern Antiquities. 
H 



50 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER I. 

And it was in the same manner that a brave hunter, the son 
of Alcmena, might be identified with the imaginary hero of 
twelve mystieal adventures, which perhaps typify the progress 
of the Sun through the twelve signs of the Zodiac. 

But although the mythology of Egypt might thus become 
incorporated in the traditional fables of the Pelasgi, by means 
of which the members of an imaginary theocracy acquired for 
themselves in Greece a local habitation and a name, it would 
appear that the abstract, or allegorical parts of the ancient 
system were still preserved without any material alteration. 
The festivals also continued to be solemnized nearly in the 
same manner, and with similar allusions to the seasons, and to 
their old physical explanation ; and Greeks who visited Egypt, 
in subsequent ages, were struck by the general conformity of 
its superstitions with their own. 

Another passage, adduced by Warburton in support of his 
opinion, has an immediate and conclusive reference to the 
Egyptian theology. St. Augustin and St. Cyprian mention 
a letter supposed to have been written by Alexander the Great, 
from Egypt, to his mother Olympias. In this epistle the 
king of Macedon communicates a most important discovery, 
made to him by an Egyptian hierophant, who is absurdly 
enough called by a Greek name, Leon. The secret was, that 
not only the demigods, such as Picus, Faunus, ^Eneas, Ro- 
mulus, Hercules, iEsculapius, Bacchus, Castor, Pollux, but 
also the gods of the greater families, to whom Cicero is sup- 
posed to allude in his Tusculan Questions, though without 
naming them, viz. Jupiter, Juno, Saturn, Vulcan, Vesta, and 
many others, whom Varro would refer to the elements and 
departments of the universe, were in reality only mortal men. 
St. Augustin adds that the priest, fearing lest the secret 
which he had communicated should be divulged, begged 
Alexander to request his mother Olympias to burn his letter 
as soon as she had read it.* 

* Augustin. Civit. Dei. lib. viii. cap. 5. 



NATURE OF THE GODS. 



51 



It is only necessary to read this fragment, as St. Augustin 
has given it, to be convinced that it is spurious ; and the only 
remarkable circumstance is, that so learned and judicious a 
writer could be imposed upon by such a palpable forgery. 
That Warburton has chosen to avail himself of it, because 
it suited his purpose, is not so much a matter of surprize. 
Jablonski has taken more trouble than seemed to be necessary, 
in order to prove that this document is quite unworthy of 
credit.* 

NOTE B. to Sect. IV. 

Ocellus divides all nature into generative causes, and passive 
or prolific principles. The theatre of the former is the region 
above the lunar sphere; the sublunary world contains the 
latter. The first of these regions is rilled with imperishable 
and immutable essences; the second, with beings subject to 
perpetual vicissitude. All the changes in the sublunary world 
are produced by the Sun, as he approaches or recedes from it. 

The sphere of the Moon forms the boundary line between 
these two regions of the world. Hence, as it would appear 
from the authors cited above, was derived the fiction which 
makes the Moon the chief seat of passive production, the 
abode of the $vcris UoXvpoptys, or Naiura Multiformis, and 
identifies her with Ceres, Isis, Diana, Latona, the powers pre- 
siding over child-birth, and all the prolific operations of nature. 
— See Ocellus Lucanus, ifsp) row iravros, cap. ii. apud Opuscula 
Mythologica. — T. Gale. Vossius, de Orig. et Prog. Idolola- 
triae, lib. ii. Dupuis, Origine de tous les Cultes, torn. ii. chap. 7* 
and compare Plutarch, de Iside et Osiride, cap. xliii. 

* Jablonski in Panth. Egypt. Prolegom. 




'I 



r\ 



CHAPTER II. 

OF THE WORSHIP OF ISIS AND OSIRIS, HORUS 
AND TYPHON. 

SECTION I. 

Recapitulation of the Orphic Doctrine. Orphic Dionusos and 
Damater, compared with Osiris and Isis. Legend of Osiris 
and Isis. 

We have briefly surveyed the most important tenets 
of the Orphic philosophy, or of that system of allego- 
ries into which the hierophants, who transplanted 
into Greece the superstitions of the Nile, resolved the 
fables of their mythology. We have seen that this 
doctrine was, in its foundation, a system of pantheism. 
It contemplated the whole of nature as animated 
by an all -pervading soul, portions of which, sometimes 
represented as existing individually, at other times 
regarded as essential parts of the common vital spirit 
of the world, were distributed to the elements, and 
to all the departments of the visible universe. We 
have observed that the mythological poets, in 
attempting to account for the generation of sublu- 
nary beings, had recourse to analogies drawn from 
the annual processes of nature ; that they sometimes 
represented the pantheus, or soul of the world, as 
masculo-feminine, or of two sexes; but more com- 
monly distinguished the active and passive powers, 
which nature seemed to display, describing the former 



54 POPULAR THEOGONY OF EGYPT. 

in a figurative manner, as the agencies of the pa- 
rent god, and the latter as the productive attributes 
of the universal mother; that these divisions nearly 
corresponded with those of the celestial and sub- 
lunary worlds, whence the phrases and epithets, 
which are so frequent among the Greek and Roman 
poets, and which recur almost as often as any allu- 
sion is made to the chief objects of their worship. We 
have seen also that the god, or rather the masculine 
soul of nature, is represented as holding his seat 
in the orb of day, and guiding its movements. In 
this character he is invoked in the Orphic hymns, by 
the names of Zeus and Dionusos, which correspond 
with the Diespiter or Jupiter, and the Liber Pater of 
the Romans. Lastly, the female divinity, Damater, or 
Ceres, is, by some ideal process which it is not so easy 
to analyse, transferred from the Earth, or from the 
sphere of sublunary nature, to the Moon ; and the Sun 
and Moon are regarded as the god and goddess of the 
world, manifesting themselves in a visible shape. We 
must now return to the more scanty mythological 
fragments of the Egyptians, from whom we are 
assured, by the testimony of all antiquity, that the 
Greeks derived their arts and civilization, and more 
especially their mysteries and theological fictions. 
We shall proceed to a more particular examination, 
and endeavour to trace in what manner the Egyp- 
tians developed those principles that were common 
to them and to the mystical poets of the early ages 
of Greece. 

We have shown by quotations from Diodorus, 
Macrobius, Chaeremon, and others, to which a long 
list of authorities might easily be added, that the 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 55 

objects of worship among the Egyptians were the 
elements and departments of nature. As the Greeks 
and Romans, though they identified their Bacchus, 
or Liber Pater, with the Sun, and their Ceres with the 
Moon, or with sublunary Nature, personified them 
in poetry, and recited their fabulous adventures ; so 
we find that the career of Isis and Osiris was cele- 
brated by the Egyptians in a train of allegorical 
fictions, conceived in that singular style which cha- 
racterizes all the works of this people. 

The legend of Isis and Osiris, connected with the 
adventures of three other fabulous beings which are 
interwoven with their story, forms a considerable 
part of the Egyptian mythology. Osiris, Typhon, 
and Aroueris, or the elder Horus, constitute a 
Triad of gods, who received supreme honours in all 
the districts of Egypt. Isis and Nephthys were the 
consorts or passive representatives of the two former. 
Concerning Aroueris, we have scarcely any infor- 
mation ; but the contests of Osiris and Typhon, hold 
almost as conspicuous a place in this system of fic- 
tions, as the wars of Jupiter and the Titans, and 
those of Ormuzd and Ahriman in the mythologies of 
Greece and Persia. 

It might perplex us to find the name of Serapis 
associated with that of Isis, in many of the Egyptian 
superstitions, in the place of Osiris, if we were not 
expressly assured by many authors, that Serapis and 
Osiris were in reality the same person. Plutarch 
informs us, that Serapis was the name by which 
Osiris was called after he had changed his nature, 
or had descended to the infernal regions. 

We possess several abstracts of the story of Isis 



56 POPULAR THEOGONY OF EGYPT. 

and Osiris. The narrative given by Plutarch seems 
to be the most faithful and genuine. His epitome 
of this legend has the air of a piece of mystical 
poetry, and displays the true style of Egyptian fiction. 
Diodorus has adorned it with many decorations, 
evidently borrowed from the fabulous poetry of the 
Greeks. He has endeavoured to give it the appearance 
of an historical narrative, and has comprised in it 
many circumstances which do not appear to have 
belonged to the legend in its original form. Thus 
he attributes to Osiris a variety of actions, such as 
the founding of cities, which other writers,, and even 
this historian himself in his Egyptian Annals, have 
ascribed to the earliest kings of Thebais. Syne- 
sius has given us another version of this story, 
extending to a considerable length, and he has intro- 
duced many variations in the recital, in order to ac- 
commodate it to an allegorical sense, which probably 
was never contemplated by the old Egyptians.* 

Both Diodorus and Plutarch commence this story 
with a singular fable, relating to the birth of the three 
gods and two goddesses whose ad ventures it celebrates. 
They were brought forth by Rhea, on the five inter- 
calary days, which were added to the twelve Egyp- 
tian months in order to complete the year. Osiris, 
Aroueris, and Typhon, were born on the three first 
days, and Isis and Nephthys on the two last. The 
two former were the offspring of the Sun, Isis of 
Mercury, and Typhon and Nephthys of Saturn. At 
the birth of Osiris a voice was heard, proclaiming 
that {{ the ruler of all the Earth was born/' 

* Synesii Opera. iEgyptius sive de Providentia. Vide 
Fabric. Bibl. Greec. torn x. 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS 57 

This fable appears, as Jablonski has remarked, 
to be an enigmatical statement, devised for some 
astronomical purpose. It rather belongs to the 
Egyptian calendar than to the theology of the 
country, and was probably invented when the 
five intercalary days were superadded to the three 
hundred and sixty contained in the old year of 
twelve months. It is entirely detached from the re- 
mainder of the mythologue, of which the following 
brief summary comprises the most remarkable 
circumstances. 

Osiris, the " Lord of the Earth/ 5 or the " Many 
eyed/' or the cc Power energetic and productive of 
good/' as some interpreted his name, called also 
Omphis, which, according to Hermaeus, signified 
the " Benefactor/' is represented as a great and 
powerful king, who, setting out from Egypt, tra- 
versed the world, leading a host of fauns and satyrs, 
and other fabulous beings, in his train, whose images 
are seen among the constellations. He civilized the 
whole earth, and taught mankind every where to 
fertilize the soil, and perform the works of agricul- 
ture. He is chiefly known among the poets, as the 
author of this art. 

Primus aratra manu solerti fecit Osiris 

Et teneram ferro solicitavit humum; 
Primus inexpertis commisit semina terrse 

Pomaque non notis legit ab arboribus. 

Tibull. lib. i. Eleg. vii. 

Hence the Van, the cc mystica vannus Iacchi/' 
which is always seen in the hand of Osiris, in the 

i 



58 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

Egyptian sculptures, and which was carried in the 
Grecian festivals of Bacchus. He was invoked by 
the Thyades with the epithet " Aixvlryg/' or bearer 
of the Van,* and we find him so described by 
Orpheus.f 

A/kv/ttjv A/ovucov lir zhycCxg ratals xixXricxa). 
"With these vows I invoke Bacchus, bearer of the Van." 

The Grecian Bacchus was thus far a perfect copy 
of the Egyptian, and the pomps, or Bacchanalian 
processions, celebrated in memory of his expedition, 
were an exact counterpart of the march of Osiris. 
Bacchus, like Osiris, assumed the form or the visage 
of a Bull. We find him thus invoked in the Orphic 
hymns.J 

Baccaps kol) Ba^so, 7ro?\.ua>vyjU,£, 7ravroSuva<rTa. 

*f Haste, blest Dionusus, of the thunderbolt 
Engendered, Bassarus or Bacchus called, 
Bull-visaged, king of many names and powers."§ 

On the return of Osiris to Egypt, Typhon laid a 
stratagem for him, and contrived, in the midst of a 
banquet, to shut him up in a chest which exactly 

* Plut. Isid. 85. 

t Gesner's Orphica, p. 240. J Ibid. 

§ Plutarch informs us that his images were often made by 
the Greeks in the shape of a Bull, and that the Elean women 
called upon the god " who comes upon the feet of an ox." 




V 




1 



| 

Sx 



,v 




\ ■ 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 59 

fitted his body. He was nailed down in this prison, 
and conveyed to the shore of the river, where the 
chest, being thrown into the Nile, floated down to the 
sea by the Tanitic mouth, cc which, for this reason/' 
says Plutarch, i( is still held in the utmost horror by 
the Egyptians, and never named but with marks of 
detestation." These events took place on the seven- 
teenth day of the month Athyri, when the Sun was in 
Scorpio, in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of 
Osiris, or, as others say, of his life. 

The first persons who discovered this catastrophe, 
were the Fauns and Satyrs who inhabited the 
country about Chemmis. As soon as Isis was made 
acquainted with it, she immediately cut off one of 
the locks of her hair, and put on mourning-robes. 
She then wandered to and fro, over the whole 
country, full of anxiety, in search of the chest, and 
inquired of every person she met, what had become 
of it, until some children, who accidentally fell in 
her way, having chanced to witness its fate, told her 
by which mouth of the Nile the vessel had been 
transmitted to the sea. 

At length Isis was informed that the chest had 
been carried by the waves of the sea to the coast of 
Byblos, and there lodged in the branches of a tama- 
risk-bush, which quickly shot up and became a large 
and beautiful tree, growing round the chest, and 
enclosing it on every side, so that it could not be 
seen. The king of the country, amazed at the vast 
size the tree had so speedily acquired, ordered it to be 
cut down, and made of it a pillar to support the roof 
of his palace; the chest being still concealed in the 



60 POPULAR RELIGION OP THE EGYPTIANS. 

trunk. These things being made known to Isis by 
a supernatural voice, she went to Byblos, and sitting 
down silently to weep by the side of a fountain, was 
at length accosted by the damsels of the queen, who 
happened to arrive at the same place. On this 
occasion, it is related that the goddess suddenly 
diffused from her person a miraculous odour, of won- 
derful fragrance, upon all around her. The queen, 
having heard of this supernatural phenomenon, 
sent for her, and appointed her to be a nurse to one 
of the king's children. Isis fed the infant by giving 
it her finger to suck, instead of her breast; she 
likewise put him every night into the fire, to consume 
his mortal part, while, transforming herself into a 
swallow, she hovered round the pillar, and bemoaned 
her sad fate. It happened at length that some cir- 
cumstance excited a suspicion in the queen respec- 
ting the conduct of the nurse. She secretly observed 
Isis, and, seeing the infant surrounded by flame, 
was seized with terror, cried out, and thus deprived 
the child of immortality. The goddess then, dis- 
covering herself, requested that the pillar which sup^ 
ported the roof might be given to her. She took it 
down, and, cutting it open with care, took out the 
enclosed sarcophagus of Osiris, and throwing her- 
self upon it, uttered so loud a lamentation, that the 
youngest of the king's children was frightened to 
death. The eldest she took with her, and placing 
the coffin in a vessel, set sail for Egypt. As she 
passed the river Phaedrus, early in the morning, it 
sent forth a sharp and rough air, whereupon Isis, in 
her anger, dried up its stream. 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 61 

Being arrived at a desert place,, she opened the 
coffin, and embracing the corse of her husband, wept 
bitterly, when, the child creeping behind her and 
discovering the cause of her grief, she turned herself 
round, and threw upon him so fierce a look, that he 
died with terror. She returned to Egypt, and 
brought the body of her husband with her. At some 
time after her arrival, going to visit her son Horus, 
who was bred up at Boutos, she deposited the chest 
in a remote place ; but Typhon, hunting by moon- 
light, happened to meet with it, and recognizing the 
corse, divided it into fourteen pieces, which he 
scattered about the country. Isis, learning this, 
went in search of the dispersed remains of her 
husband's body, sailing over the fenny parts of 
the country in a boat made of papyrus. She re- 
covered all the fragments except one, which, having 
been thrown into the Nile, had been devoured by the 
Lepidotus, Phagrus, and Oxyrhynchus. Thesefishes 
the Egyptians consequently held in abomination. 
' c Instead of it, she consecrated the Phallus, which is 
still used in the solemnities of the Egyptians/' Osiris 
afterwards returned from the shades, and appeared to 
his son Horus, who vanquished Typhon in battle and 
took him prisoner ; but Isis set him at liberty. Where- 
upon Horus was so much enraged, that he tore off 
his mother's diadem ■ but Hermes placed upon her 
head a helm, in the shape of the head of an ox. Osiris 
having returned from the subterranean realms, Isis 
became pregnant, and bore the infant Harpocrates, 
premature and weak in his lower limbs. It seems that 
the story originally contained an account of the dis- 
memberment of Horus and beheading of Isis, which 



62 INTERPRETATION OF THE 

Plutarch has chosen to omit, as too degrading to the 
character of such august personages. 



SECTION II. 

Interpretation of the Legend of Isis and Osiris. 

In the foregoing section, we have mentioned the 
principal circumstances comprised in the celebrated 
legend of Isis and Osiris. It now remains to collect 
the observations which the ancient writers have left 
us, with a view to the interpretation of this enigma- 
tical story, and to determine in what light it must be 
considered. 

Nothing is more obvious than that it is a fiction, in 
the composition of which, the narrative of real occur- 
rences can have had little or no share. It is likewise 
evident that many of the incidents related in it are 
matters of pure fabrication, invented for the purpose 
of sanctioning or accounting for certain rites and 
observances, which had been in use from time imme- 
morial among the Egyptians. Such is the story 
respecting the origin of phallic worship, a superstition 
which certainly took its rise from a very different 
source. The whole of the legend might well pass for 
a mere popular tale, without any meaning or assign- 
able object, if it did not contain some circumstances, 
particularly the connection of several of the incidents 
with certain times of the year and with astronomical 
phenomena, which tend to confirm the assertion of 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 63 

the ancient writers, who regard it as a physical 
allegory. 

We have before observed that the Greek mytholo- 
gists, under the name of Bacchus, personified the Sun, 
or the fertilizing principle of the elements, which was 
supposed to reside in the solar orb, and, by means of 
its light and heat to fecundate the region of passive 
or sublunary nature. Osiris is identified with 
Bacchus by all the Greek writers, particularly by 
Herodotus; and that Osiris bore the same relation to 
the Sun as Bacchus, we are assured by several authors 
already cited. Plutarch, indeed, mentions that the 
Egyptians were accustomed to clothe the statues of 
Osiris with a veil of the colour of flame, from an idea 
that the Sun was the visible body of this god, or of 
the good principle or beneficent power of nature; 
and he says that in their sacred hymns they invoked 
him as the divinity cc who is concealed in the arms of 
the Sun."* 

As we do not possess any complete and explicit 
interpretation of this mythologue, sanctioned by 
such testimony as might enable us to depend with 
confidence upon its authority, we must direct our 
attention to the series of festivals, and the nature 
of the religious ceremonies which were performed in 
a certain order through every year, in celebration of 
the whole train of mystical adventures. These we 
shall find to be connected with the changes of the 
seasons, and the most remarkable topics of the Sun's 
annual progress. The principal festivals, not only in 
Egypt, but in Syria, Phrygia, and Greece, and 

* Plut. de Iside et Osir. cap. 52. 



64 INTERPRETATION OF THE 

wherever similar rites of mythology prevailed, were 
solemnized at the latter end of the autumn, at the 
season when the leaves fall and the vital force of 
Nature seems to languish and become extinct, and 
again at the beginning of spring, when her productive 
energies appear to awaken to new activity. The 
superstitious rites that were practised at the former 
period were, in general, of a melancholy character, 
and consisted of mournful exhibitions and lamenta- 
tions. At the latter, they were of a opposite descrip- 
tion, and abounded in scenes of mirth and revelry. 
The fictitious incidents in the histories of the gods, 
which were respectively connected with these periods, 
were in harmony with the nature of the ceremonies 
exhibited, and the feelings excited by the aspects of 
nature. The adventures solemnized at the approach 
of winter were gloomy and sorrowful ; in the spring 
they were joyous and triumphant. The following 
verses of Manilius describe the ideas and sentiments 
which may be supposed to have given origin, among 
barbarous people, to these customs. 

" Nam rudis ante illos nullo discrimine vita 
In speciem conversa, operum ratione carebat^ 
Et stupefacta novo pendebat lumine mundi; 
Turn velut amissis moerens, turn lseta remotis 
Sideribus, variosque dies, incertaque noctis 
Tempora^ nee similes umbras, jam sole regresso, 
Jam properante, suis poterat discernere caussis."* 

A passage of Macrobius, relating to the ceremonies 
performed in honour of Adonis in Syria, illustrates 

* Manil, lib. i. 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 65 

the character of these rites. " The worshippers of 
nature deified the upper hemisphere of the world 
under which we dwell, giving it the name of Venus, 
and termed the inferior hemisphere, Proserpine. Ac- 
cordingly, the goddess of the Syrians, or Phoenicians, 
is feigned to lament when the Sun, in his annual pro- 
gress through the twelve sijnis of the Zodiac, enters 
a part of the lower hemisphere, or that division which 
is considered as the inferior half. When the Sun 
arrives in the lower signs, and the days begin to 
shorten, Venus is represented as lamenting him, as if 
he were snatched away from her by death, and de- 
tained by Proserpine ; that is to say, by the power 
which presides over the lower circle of the world and 
the Antipodes. x\gain, they pretend that Adonis is 
restored to Venus when the Sun, having made his 
way through the six inferior signs, begins to traverse 
the regions of our upper hemisphere, bestowing upon 
us an increase of light and longer days." cc As soon 
as he has passed the vernal equinox, the goddess was 
said again to rejoice, the fields and pastures becoming 
now verdant with corn and fresh herbage, and the 
trees with new foliage/' ec It was on this account/' 
says Macrobius, iC that the ancients dedicated to 
Venus the month of April." He observes, that 
cc Adonis was said to have been killed by a wild boar, 
which was an emblem of winter," and describes a 
statue representing the goddess iC in the period of grief 
and lamentation, which was adorned with the symbols 
of Nature mourning in the wintry season." The same 
author subjoins, that the Phrygians worshipped 
Attis, and the Mother of the gods, with similar rites. 
He infers^ that all these ceremonies certainly related 



66 INTERPRETATION OP THE 

to the Sun, because, after the descent of the god 
into the nether world had been solemnized with 
mourning and lamentation, a period of mirth and 
joyful festivities ensued ; the commencement of 
which happened exactly at the time, when the Sun 
overcomes the power of darkness, and renders the 
day longer than the night. The festival of rejoicing 
was celebrated on the day termed Hilaria,* that is 
on the twenty-fifth of March. f 

We shall add the concluding remark of Macro- 
bius, which is more important with respect to our 
present inquiry. ff The same religious customs 
prevail in Egypt under different names; for it is well 
known that Osiris is no other than the Sun, and Isis 
than the Earth, or Terrene Nature; and the same 
circumstances which led to the worship of Adonis and 
Attis, give rise to the alternate repetitions of mournful 
and joyful festivals in the superstitions of Egypt." J 

Clemens Alexandrinus has remarked the affinity of 
all these mournful ceremonies of the Asiatics, and 
other fictions on which they are dependent, with the 
Thesmophoria, Scirrhophoria, and other solemnities, 
which were reported, as he says, to have been intro- 
duced from Egypt. § Many authors remark the simi- 
litude which the ceremonies in honour of the Egyptian 
Osiris bore to those of the Syrian Adonis. In both, 
the disappearance of the god was commemorated with 

* Macrobii. Saturnal. lib. i. cap. 21. 

t This was the day on which the Romans celebrated the 
termination of the winter and the vernal equinox. 
J Macrob. ibid. 
§ Clemens Alexaad. Cohort, ad gentes, p. 13, p. xx. 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 67 

lamentations, and his restoration with joy and festivity,* 
and Salambo, the Syrian Venus, wandered about like 
Isis, lamenting her lost Adonis. f 

It is to be regretted that we have not exact accounts 
of the periods at which all the festivals of the Egyptians 
returned. We have, however, sufficient assurance in 
general, that the mournful ceremonies of that people 
were solemnized at the decline of the year, and the 
joyful rites towards the return of spring, and that the 
former were connected with the misfortunes of Osiris 
and the grief of Isis, the latter with the re-appearance 
of the god, or with the renewal of his career. 

One of the most explicit passages occurs in the 
commentary of Achilles Tatius on Aratus, which, 
according to Scaliger's opinion, was preserved from 
the works of Eudoxus, a writer whose testimony is 
of the highest authority. § cc The Egyptians," he says, 
" when they observed the Sun descending from the 
Crab towards Capricorn, and the days gradually dimi- 
nish, were accustomed to lament, from the apprehen- 
sion that the Sun was about to desert them entirely. 
This period coincided with the festival of Isis. But 
when the luminary began to return, and the days grew 
longer, they dressed themselves in white robes and 
crowned their heads with garlands." || 

Julius Firmicus, though unwilling to admit an 
explanation that seemed to afford an apology for any 
pagan superstition, has given his testimony to the same 
facts. He says that those funereal rites and lamenta- 

* Marsham. Chronicon iEgyptiacum, &c. 

f Selden de Diis Syriis, syntagm. ii. cap. 4. 

§ See Commentary on Chap. ii. Note A. 

|| Petavius de Doctrina Temporum, torn Hi. p. 85, 



68 INTERPRETATION OF THE 

tions which the Egyptians practised are explained by 
the defenders of Paganism in a physical sense. cc Hanc 
volunt esse mortem Osiridis, cum fruges reddunt terras ; 
inventionem vero cum fruges genitali terrae fomento 
conceptae, nova rursus cceperint procreatione ge- 
nerari." 

The poet Rutilius alludes to the joyful ceremonies 
practised in the spring, in his Itinerary, written at a 
time when the superstitions of Egypt were not yet 
extinct. 

Ci Et turn forte hilares per compita rustica pagi 
Mulcebant sociis pectora fessa jocis; 
Illo quippe die tandem renovatus Osiris 
Excitat in fruges germina laeta novas." 

Plutarch enters into a more minute detail concerning 
several of these festivals. The following is the account 
he has given of the ceremony relating to the disappear- 
ance or death of Osiris. It was on the seventeenth 
day of the Egyptian month Athyr, which answers to 
the thirteenth of November, when the Sun was in 
Scorpio, that Osiris was shut up in the fatal chest. 
Accordingly, on that day, the Aphanism, or disappear- 
ance of the god, was solemnized. " At this season," 
says our author, cc when the Etesian winds abandon 
Egypt, and the Nile returns to its banks, and the land is 
desolated by the approach of winter — when, the length 
of night also encreasing, darkness prevails and the 
power of light is diminished, the Egyptian priests, 
among other mournful rites, covered a gilded cow with 
a pall of fine black linen, and exhibited it as an emblem 
of the lamentation of Isis. This ceremony was per- 
formed during four days successively, beginning at the 



LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 69 

seventeenth of Athyr, to represent the four objects of 
lamentation at this season of the year, viz. first, the 
decrease of the Nile and the return of its waters to 
their channel; secondly, the cessation of the salutary 
northern winds, which were now extinguished by the 
prevalence of southern blasts ; thirdly, the shortness of 
the day and the protracted length of night ; and lastly, 
the desolate condition of the earth, now naked and 
destitute of herbage, while the trees are at the same 
time stripped of their leaves/'* c( Of a similar nature/' 
says Plutarch, " were those various ceremonies which 
were celebrated among other nations at the same 
season, such as the Thesmophoria of the Athenians, 
(which were copied from the Egyptianf festival of 
Isis,) and the Epachthse of the Boeotians/' so termed 
from the grief of Ceres for the loss of her daughter 
Proserpine, who had been carried away to the infernal 
regions. \ In this solemnity, the shrines of the goddess 

* Plutarch. Isid. et Osir. cap. 39. f Ibid. cap. 69. 

X We have seen that the Grecian Ceres corresponds with 
the Egyptian Isis. The grief of Ceres at the loss of her 
daughter, who was carried away to the infernal regions, was 
substituted by the Greeks for the sorrow of Isis at the dis- 
appearance of Osiris; and these events were solemnized at the 
same season. Bacchus also, the Grecian Osiris, descended to 
Hades; and Bacchus and Ceres, after their descent, seem to 
have been metamorphosed into Pluto and Hecate. So Osiris, 
after his descent, became Serapis; and Isis, as we shall see 
hereafter, underwent a similar change of name and character. 
The double character of Bacchus, or Osiris, is alluded to in the 
following lines of Ausonius : 

Aiyvrfrov [lev v O<ripis hyuu, Mucrwv 8e <&ava>oj^ 

Banjos sv) ^cuo7a-iv, sv) (f>QipLsvoi$ 'A'i8ujv£v$ 

Tfvpoyevri$, SUspws, riravokstys, Aiovvo-os. Auson. Eclog: 



70 INTERPRETATION OF THE 

were carried up and down in procession. {i Now 
the common time." says Plutarch, " for the solemni- 
zation of all these festivals, was within that month in 
which the Pleiades appear, and the husbandmen sow 
their corn, which the Egyptians call Athyr, the Athe- 
nians, Pyanepsion, and the Boeotians, Dama^kis." 
fe The Phrygians," he continues, " also suppose their 
god to sleep during the winter, and to awaken in the 
summer, and at one time they celebrate his retiring to 
rest, and at another, with mirth and revelry, rouse him 
from his slumbers. The Paphlagonians pretend that 
he is bound and imprisoned in the winter- months, and 
that in summer he is restored to liberty and motion."* 
Immediately after mentioning this solemnity, Plutarch 
subjoins an account of another, of an opposite descrip- 
tion, which, if we judge from the text of this author 
as it now stands, would be supposed to have followed 
immediately the foregoing rites, or rather to have 
occurred during the midst of them. He says, " on 
the nineteenth of the month, they march by night in 
procession towards the sea- shore, and the Stolistae and 
Priests bear the sacred chest, containing a little ark of 
gold, into which they pour fresh water, and at the same 
time raise a shout that, ce Osiris is found '!" They after- 
wards mix fertile earth with the water, and, adding 

ec I am the Osiris of Egypt, called Phanaces by 
the Mysians, Bacchus among the living, and A'ido- 
neus or Pluto among the dead ; offspring of fire, two- 
horned, the Titan-killer Dionusus." 

* Herod, lib. ii. cap. 171. 

f The ancient Persians held their festivals nearly at the 
same periods. See the Commentary, Note B. 






LEGEND OF ISIS AND OSIRIS. 71 

spices and costly perfumes, form a little image of a 
lunated figure, which they dress up and adorn."* 

Many authors allude to this festival, which was 
celebrated with much clamorous rejoicing. Juvenal 
refers to it thus : 

<f Exclamare libet populus quod clamat Osiri 
Invento." 

On which the Scholiast observes, that the crowd ex- 
claimed, when the god was declared to be found, 
s'jpr l x& t u.sv J trwyxoufQfjLs*. " We have found him, rejoice/' 

Notwithstanding the expressions of Plutarch, it can 
scarcely be supposed that this ceremony was performed 
in the month Athyr. Its proper period cannot be 
ascertained precisely; but there are many circumstances 
which indicate that it was celebrated some time after 
the winter-solstice ;f for about the time of the solstice 
another ceremony was performed, which was termed 
the Zetesis, or Search after Osiris, and it would seem 
that the Discovery must have been subsequent to this. 
Besides, if we advert to the legend with which these 
festivals were connected, we find that the discovery 
of the remains of Osiris must have happened subse- 
quently to the return of Isis to Egypt ; and we are 
assured that her arrival from Phoenicia was solemnized 
on the seventh day of the month Tybi, which answers 
to the second of January. J 

The search, as we have remarked, was celebrated 
at the solstice. " At this time," says Plutarch, " the 

* Plutarch, ibid. cap. 29. 

f See further remarks on this subject in the Commentary 
on this Chapter, Note C. 
% Plut. de Isid. cap. 50, 



72 INTERPRETATION OF THE 

Egyptians lead the sacred Cow/' the living image of 
Isis, round the temple seven times ; this season of the 
year standing most in need of the sun's warmth. He 
adds, that the rite was performed seven times, to indi- 
cate that the god does not complete his return to the 
summer- tropic until the seventh month afterwards.* 

The response of an oracle of Apollo, quoted by 
Eusebius, probably alludes to the last mentioned 
ceremony, or to that which was solemnized in the 
month Athyr.f 

fJLOUTTeUSW (TSKTrOKTlU SOU 7T0(TW OL^pOV 0(TlplU. 

" To Isis it is given, beside the flood 
Of genial Nile, in garb of woe to roam, 
And, by the deep-toned sistrum's mournful clang, 
To seek her dear Osiris." 

ff At the new moon of the month Phamenoth, (which 
nearly corresponds to March,) the Egyptians hold/' 
says Plutarch, " a festival which they term the entrance 
of Osiris into the Moon, and which marks the begin- 
ning of spring." cc Thus," he continues, " they place 
the power of Osiris in the Moon, and represent Isis, 
which means the prolific qualities of nature, as im- 
pregnated by him. Accordingly, they term the Moon 
the mother of the world, and represent her as both 
male and female, as receiving emanations from the 
Sun, becoming fertilized, and then diffusing her 
genial influences through the air." 



* Pint, de Isid. cap. 52. 
f Euseb. Prsep. Ev. lib. 



v. cap. 7. 



OP ISIS AND OSIRIS. 73 

cc At the time of sowing the seed/' says Plutarch, 
U the burial of Osiris was solemnized, and this cere- 
mony was thought to denote the covering of the seed 
in the earth ; and the resurrection or re-appearance of 
Osiris, the shooting up of the green herb. In allusion 
to this allegory, Isis, upon perceiving herself to be 
pregnant, is said to have hung an amulet about her 
neck in the month Phaophi, soon after the sowing 
time, and to have brought forth the infant Harpocrates, 
about the time of the solstice, when the herbage is just 
springing and shooting forth. Hence also the first- 
fruits of the Egyptian lentils were said to be dedicated 
to this god, and the Ao^eTa, or purification of Isis, was 
celebrated after the vernal equinox.* 

We shall mention only one other Egyptian festival, 
which is that of the Paamylia. It consisted in a 
Bacchanalian pomp, resembling the Phallephoria, or 
Priapei'a of the Greeks, in which the mystic emblems 
of Osiris were borne in procession. f This ceremony 
was instituted by Isis, according to the mythologue, 
after she had discovered the remains of her husband, 
which had been scattered about by Typhon. It is, 
therefore, probable, that it was celebrated in the 
spring, which, as we have seen, was the season of 
joyful festivals among the Egyptians. The meaning 
of these strange exhibitions, as explained by all the 
ancient writers, was to represent in striking emblems 
the fertilizing influences of the elements, by which 
nature was supposed to be fecundated in the genial 
season of the spring. 

* Plut. de Isid. cap. 65. 
t Plut. ibid, cap. 12. Herod, lib. ii. cap. 48. 
L 



74 INTERPRETATION OF THE LEGEND. 

On the whole, we may, I believe, be permitted to 
conclude, that the festivals celebrated in honour of 
Isis and Osiris were connected with the changes of 
the year, and the most striking phsenomena of nature 
in the different seasons. Moreover, as these solemni- 
ties in their succession, and in the nature and meaning 
of the rites in which they consisted, bore an evident 
reference to the legend of which we have given an 
abstract in some former pages, it appears that we are 
to regard that fiction in the light of a physical allegory, 
representing, in figurative and highly fanciful allusions, 
the annual progress of the sun and the order of the 
seasons. At the same time it must be supposed, that 
this outline has been filled up by many chimerical 
circumstances, in order to render it more popular. 

We must here, for a reason that will afterwards 
appear, distinguish the history and rites of Osiris from 
a variety of emblems and figurative representations 
which referred merely to the Sun. It was not simply 
towards the orb of the sun that the Egyptians addres- 
sed their superstitious devotions ; but to the genera- 
tive or productive power of Nature, which at certain 
seasons is displayed in a peculiar manner in the in- 
fluence of the Sun. For at some periods, Osiris held his 
abode in the Moon ; at others he had become effete, 
and had passed into Hades, and his absence from the 
upper world was deplored. The Sun was yet visible; 
but the productive powers which he had displayed in 
the vernal season had now abandoned him. 

That Osiris was not merely a name for the Sun, and 
that the superstitions addressed to him are different 
from the common solar worship, is indeed evident from 
the distinction made by Herodotus and all the other 



NATURE OF OSIRIS. 75 

Greek writers who treat of Egyptian manners. It is 
certain that the Egyptians had a system of rites in 
adoration of the Sun, altogether distinct from the cere- 
monies of Osiris. The former belonged particularly 
to the Heliopolitan norae, while we are assured that 
the latter were common to the whole Egyptian people. 



SECTION III. 

Continuation of the same subject. General Conclusion re- 
specting the nature of Osiris. Typhon, Horus } Egyptian 
Triad, Harpocrates, Serapis. 

It was not the light and heat alone of the solar rays 
that were considered by the Egyptians as the attri- 
butes of Osiris. He was worshipped, if we may 
believe Plutarch, in every department of prolific 
nature ; and all those elements or visible objects in 
which any productive energy was fancied to reside, 
were believed to be only various modes or manifes- 
tations of this god. 

Next to the influence of the Sun, there is no 
element which appears in so striking a manner to be 
a physical cause of the production and growth of 
organized beings, particularly of those which belong 
to the vegetable kingdom, as moisture. In Egypt 
especially, the waters of the Nile so rapidly fertilize 
the arid and otherwise sterile soil, and give rise in 
so remarkable a way to an exuberant increase in 
animal and vegetable nature, that it would be sin- 
gular if the ideas, suggested by these phaenomena, 
had not left their impression on the mythology of the 



76 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

people. In fact, the Nile was regarded by the 
Egyptians with peculiar veneration. Plutarch says,, 
cc they held the Nile to be the parent and saviour of 
Egypt, and an emanation from Osiris ;"* and there 
are so many passages in the ancient writers which 
identify Osiris and the Nile, that two of the most 
learned writers of modern times, Joseph Scaliger,f 
and Selden>$ were persuaded that they were the 
same, or that Osiris was, in the original and proper 
sense, a personification of the sacred river. Eusebius 
indeed asserts expressly, that cc Osiris was the Nile, 
which the Egyptians supposed to flow down from 
heaven ;" and we find the same testimony in the 
following invocation of Propertius :§ 

ce Nile Pater, quanam possum te dicere causa, 

Aut quibus in terris occuluisse caput : 
Te propter nullos tellus tua postulat imbres, 

Arida nee pluvio supplicat herba Jovi; 
Te canit atque suum pubes miratur Osirim, 

Barbara Memphitem plangere docta bovem." 

Many other passages to the same purpose might 
be quoted from the ancient writers. Several of these 
have been adduced by the authors above mentioned, 
as well as by Jablonski, who nevertheless maintains 
a contrary opinion. || 

* Plutarch de Iside et Osiride. 

f Scalig. de Emendatione Temporum, p. 370. 

% Selden de Diis Syriis, Syntagm. lib. i. cap, 4. 

§ Propert. lib. i. eleg. 8. 

|| Jablonski insists on interpreting Osiris as the solar orb 
merely, and endeavours to explains away all the testimonies 
which are in opposition to this more limited sense. 



NATURE OF OSIRIS. 77 

Plutarch informs us, that many of the Egyptian 
philosophers regarded Osiris as a river-god, in his 
true and original meaning, and supposed that the 
lamentation made on account of his feigned death, or 
disappearance, referred to the decrease of the water 
of the Nile. He adds, that when the Nile was 
regarded as Osiris, or the active cause, Isis, or the 
passive cause, was referred to the land of Egypt, 
which is fertilized or rendered prolific by the inun- 
dation ;* so strictly did the interpreters adhere to 
the principles of the physical allegory of which we 
have surveyed a part. But the more profound and 
learned of the Egyptians generalized their ideas, and 
represented Osiris as a type of the element of mois- 
ture, or of water universally, which they regarded as 
the great genial principle of all nature, calling forth 
and cherishing the fruits of the earth. f On this 
notion was founded the custom of bearing a vessel 
full of water as a type or symbol, in all the proces- 
sions that was celebrated in honour of this god. This 
dogma was one of the principles of that physiology 
or doctrine respecting nature, which Thales, the 
founder of the Ionic school, is said to have learned in 
Egypt; and it appears to have been borrowed from 
thence by some Grecian mystics or philosophers before 
the age of Thales. Such, at least, is the sense attri- 
buted by Plutarch to a well-known verse of Homer: 

Q/Xsavov T£, Qscuv yivsriv xoCi jaTjrepa TtjAov. £ 

* Plutarch de Is. cap. 36. f Plutarch, ibid. 

% • Aristotle says, " that was a very ancient doctrine among 
the Greeks, that all things were produced from Oceanus and 
Tethys, and that the well-known custom of swearing by the 
Styx had its origin in this fable. — Aristot. Met. lib. i. cap. 3. 



78 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

Tethys is the Earth in general, which is here 
mentioned in relation with water, the fertilizing 
principle. 

From the comparison of these explanations, and 
others of a similar kind, all of which appear to have 
had a solid foundation in the rites and doctrines of 
the Egyptians, we learn that Osiris was not simply 
the Sun or the Nile, but every part of nature in 
which productive qualities are displayed. Osiris 
clearly seems to have represented the active energy 
of nature, the beneficent or generative influence of 
the elements, wherever exhibited ; Isis, the passive 
cause, or the prolific powers of nature, in the sublu- 
nary world. Hence Osiris was sometimes worshipped 
in the Sun, whose rays vivify and gladden the earth, 
and at whose return, in the vernal season, all its 
organized productions receive a new generation ; and 
sometimes in the Nile, whose waters bestow riches 
on the land of Egypt. Isis, as we have shown from 
the repeated assertions of the ancient writers, was 
the Earth or sublunary Nature in general; or, in a 
more confined sense, the soil of Egypt which is over- 
flowed by the Nile ; or the prolific or genial principle, 
the goddess of generation and all production. Consi- 
dered jointly, Osiris and Isis are the universal being, 
the soul of nature, corresponding with the Pantheus 
or Masculo-feminine Jupiter of the Orphic verses. 

OF TYPHON. 

It is not easy to perceive how the dogma of two 
independent principles can be reconciled with the 
genius of the Pantheistic system. Yet we discover 



NATURE OF TYPHON. 79 

something very like it in the mythology of Egypt.* 
Typhon stands opposed to Osiris, just as Ahriman 
does to Ormuzd, in the religion of Zoroaster. The 
chief difference between these two schemes seems to 
consist in this circumstance, that the Egyptian fable 
is more entirely founded on physical principles. In 
the Persian doctrine, Ahriman was not simply a per- 
sonification of natural evil ; his attributes comprehend 
also moral evil ; but as we have seen that Osiris 
was physical good, or the productive or generative 
power, so Typhon seems to have represented all the 
destructive causes in nature. <c Whatever, " says 
Plutarch, " is turbulent, or noxious, or disorderly in 
irregular seasons, or a distempered condition of the 
air, or in eclipses of the Sun and Moon, are incursions 
and representations of Typhon. "f 

Typhon and Nephthys stand opposed, in every 
instance, to Osiris and Isis. As all fertile regions 
and prolific causes belong to the latter, so all sterile 
and unproductive elements are the peculiar reign of 
the former.^ When Osiris is the fertilizing Nile, 
Typhon is the barren sea, the " kovtos arpuysrog/' 
which swallows it up ; and hence the sea, and even 
the salt which is produced from it, were held in abo- 
mination by the Egyptians. When Osiris is water> 
or humidity in general, Typhon is heat and drought. 
As the land of Egypt, which is fertilized by the waters 
„ of the Nile, was the reign of Isis, so the desert, which 
lies beyond the genial influence of the river-god, was 
the unfruitful Nephthys.§ When these barren tracts 
were overflowed and rendered fertile by an unusual 

* See Plut. de Isid. sect. 45, 49. f Ibid. 

% Ibid. sect. 40. § Ibid. sect. S8. 



80 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

extent of the inundation, then Osiris was said to leave 
his garland of melilotus in the bed of Nephthys; and 
this phenomenon was recorded in the physical allegory 
of the Egyptians. When Osiris was recognized in the 
Northern or Etesian winds, so salubrious in Upper 
Egypt, Typhon was the Tyfoon, or southern blast, 
which blows from the desert, and burns up and 
destroys every thing that has life.* Lastly, when 
Osiris was the light and fire of the Sun, Typhon was 
the darkness of winter, which is predominant from the 
month of Athyr, when Osiris was overcome by his 
adversary, until the following spring, when he again 
returned to Isis, and diffused, in the month of Phame- 
noth, his genial influences over the sublunary world. 
" In short," says Plutarch, IC every thing that is of 
an evil or malignant nature, either in the animal, the 
vegetable, or the intellectual world, is looked upon in 
general as the operation of Typhon, as part of him/ 
or as the effect of his influence. "f 

Hence all those animals which are of hideous aspect, 
or of fierce and untamable disposition, were sacred to 
Typhon, and were regarded as living representations 
of him. J Among these, the Crocodile and the Hippo- 
potamus are mentioned by several writers § as the most 
remarkable. The Typhonian animals were symbols of 
darkness and destruction. The Hippopotamus was an 
emblem of the western pole, the Zocpog, or dark region, 

* Plut. de Isid. sect. 40, 41, 43. f Ibid. sect. 50. 

I The peculiar relation which the sacred animals were 
imagined to bear to the gods, will be a subjeet of investiga- 
tion in a later part of this work. 

§ Plut. ibid.— Aelian. — Strabo, cited below. 






OF HORUS. 81 

which swallows up the Sun and the other celestial 
bodies. He was seen figured in this view in the temple 
of Apollinopolis, standing- with open jaws, and gaping 
upwards to ingulph the descending lights of heaven.* 

The Crocodile was also associated with the same 
ideas. iC A crocodile crouching/' says Horapollo., 
(C was a symbol of the West; and the tail of a Crocodile 
was the hieroglyphic character which expressed dark- 
ness in the sacred sculpture of the Egyptians. "f 

The Crocodile was the favourite object of worship 
among the inhabitants of the Ombite nome ; and in the 
remaining sculptures of the temple of Ombos, the 
highest honours are appropriated to a figure with the 
head of a Crocodile. | We might hence suppose that 
the Ombites worshipped Typhon as their peculiar 
divinity ; but it is difficult to account for the insignia 
with which the Typhonian figure in their temple is 
adorned ; and which are elsewhere associated with and 
appear to be the distinguishing badges of Osiris. 



OF HORUS, OR AROUER1S. 

The elder Horus, or Aroueris, was the brother of 
Osiris ;§ but Horus is generally considered as the son 
of Isis and Osiris,, and the relation of the former to the 
latter Horus is unknown to us. Horus, however, was 

* Euseb. Prsep. Evang. lib. iii. cap. 12. 
f Horapoll. Hieroglyph, lib. i. cap. 69, 70. 
% See the splendid work of the French Institute, Description 
de l'Egypte, torn. i. pi. 43. 
§ Plutarch, cap. 12. 

M 



82 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

the third, or the younger of the three divinities which 
compose the pantheistic triad of the Egyptians. 

The Greeks generally regarded Horus as identical 
with their Apollo.* Sometimes they consider him as 
Priapus.f His attributes are not clearly distinguished 
from those of Osiris. It would, however, appear, 
from the incidents mentioned in the legend of which 
we have given an abstract, as well as from the physical 
interpretation derived from the ancient writers, that 
as Osiris and Typhon were the generating and the 
destroying powers, so Horus was the renovator and 
preserver of nature, who overcomes for a time, 
though he cannot exterminate, Typhon, and restores 
the dominion of Osiris. 

From the circumstance that the Greeks regarded 
Horus as Apollo, it appears that the Egyptian god 
bore some near relation to the Sun. According to 
Plutarch, the books of Hermes ascribed to him the 
office of presiding over that luminary, and guiding its 
movements. J Light was one of his attributes; and 
obelisks, being emblems, as we are informed, of the 
solar rays, were dedicated to him. In the inscription 
on the Heliopolitan obelisk, of which an interpretation 
was furnished by Hermapion,§ Horus is termed the su- 
preme lord and author of time, with an evident reference 
to his office as god of the solar orb and revolution ; 
and in a statue described by Montfaucon, which 
appears, from other characteristics, to represent this 
deity, the Sun is seen sculptured over the head of the 
god. || 

* Herod, lib. ii. passim. f Suidas. voce Upiaitos. 

X Plutarch, cap. 61. § Ammianus Marcellinus. 

|| Montfaucon, Antiquite Explique*e, torn. ii. part 2, pi. 119, 
fig. 3. 



OF HORUS. 83 

Plutarch supposes that Horus included the whole 
visible world;* and this idea had probably some 
foundation, as it is consistent with the genius of 
the pantheistic mythology, f to refer all parts of 
the universe to Horus as well as to Osiris. In con- 
formity with this notion, the festival held on the thir- 
tieth day of the month Epiphi, at which time the Sun 
and the Moon were supposed to be in the same right 
line with the earth, was termed the " Genethlia/' or 
the festal day of Horus's eyes; and these two lumina- 
ries were enigmatically termed the Eyes of Horus. J 

The emblems of generation, or production in ge- 
neral, belong to Horus not less remarkably than to 
Osiris. This is shown distinctly by his statues, the 
form and insignia of which are described by Suidas, 
in a passage to which I would rather refer the 
reader than translate it.§ The same circumstance is 
evident in the remains of Egyptian sculpture. The 
form of Horus may be recognized in most of the 
temples of the Thebaid, with the characteristics of 
Priapus. || 

Aelian likewise terms Horus the chief cause of the 
production of fruits and the luxuriance of the seasons ;H 

* Plutarch, cap. 52. 

f We shall make some observations illustrative of this 
remark in a following Book. 

X Plutarch, cap, 52. § Suidas, loc. citat. 

|| Horus may be distinguished from Osiris by his coeffure. 
The mystic Van also is figured above and behind him ; not in 
his hand, as it is in that of Osiris : in other respects his form 
resembles Priapus. Certain plants are sometimes growing by 
his side on an altar. See Description de i'Egypt, torn. iii. 
pi. 52, et alibi. 

1T Aelian de Animal, lib. ii. cap. 10. 



84 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

and Plutarch says, he was supposed to represent that 
quality in the air which nourishes and preserves all 
living being's.* 

The mystic Van of Tacchus belonged to Horus as 
well as to Osiris; and hence the Greeks considered 
Horus as Bacchus, though this name more properly 
belonged to the elder god. Hence it is that we find 
Bacchus termed the offspring of Jove and Proserpine, 
that, is of Serapis and Isis. He is so invoked by 
Orpheus. f 

Aiog xou Hsporstyovelag 
appyroig "XsxrpoKTi rexvcoQsig, afiGpors Aa7[xov. 

" Immortal daemon^ born in the mystic bed of 
Jove and Proserpine/' 

From all these circumstances, I think it appears 
that Horus is only distinguished from Osiris as the 
successor and renovator of his career, the restorer of 
his reign. Osiris is the generator, Horus the reno- 
vator or preserver. 



OF THE EGYPTIAN TRIAD. 

We thus find that the Egyptian triad contains a 
triple personification of the generative, the destruc- 
tive, and the restoring powers of nature. 

To each of the three gods a female divinity cor- 
responded. The latter were Isis, Nepthys, and 
Boubastis. They appear to have been counterparts 
or passive representatives of the nature and attributes 
of the three gods. But we shall have occasion, in a 

7] vcofyucra. Plutarch, c. 61. f Orphica Gesneri, p. 222. 



OF HARPOCRATES. 85 

subsequent chapter to consider more fully the history 
and characters of the Egyptian goddesses. 



OF HARPOCRATES. 

Herodotus has repeatedly mentioned Isis, Osiris, 
and Typhon, as well as Horus, the son of the two 
former deities. Yet we no where find in his works 
the slightest notice of Harpocrates, who is also called 
the offspring of Isis and Osiris. Among later authors, 
Harpocrates is perhaps still more celebrated than 
Horus. 

The silence of Herodotus, in this particular, creates 
a suspicion that he regarded Harpocrates as the same 
divinity as Horus. 

Egyptian sculptures often represent the infant 
child of Isis in the arms of his mother, or suckled at 
her breast. In many instances, the god holds his 
finger on his mouth. Those forms which are thus 
characterized have been supposed to belong to 
Harpocrates ; the others have been termed figures of 
Horus. 

This distinction was known to the ancients. The 
finger held upon the lips was supposed to intimate 
secrecy ; and hence Harpocrates was considered as 
the god of silence and mystery. This idea occurs in 
a verse of Ovid, alluding to Harpocrates: 

" Quique premit vocem digitoque silentia suadet."* 

The same god is termed, by Ausonius, Sigalion, or 
the imposer of silence. 

* Ovid. Metam. lib. ix. v. 691. 



86 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

" Tu velut Oebaliis habites taciturnus Amyclis, 
Aut tua Sigalion iEgyptius oscula signet 
Obnixum Pauline taces."* 

" You, Paulinus, remain obstinately silent, 
like a mute inhabitant of the Spartan Amyclae, or 
as if the Egyptian Sigalion sealed your lips." 

The linger held upon the mouth may, however, 
have been intended to convey merely the idea of 
infancy, or tender age, as typified by the form of a 
child too young to articulate ; at least all that we 
can learn concerning Harpocrates seems to refer 
simply to this indication. Plutarch, to whom we 
owe chiefly the information we possess concerning 
this god, says, he was represented as a weak and 
imperfect infant, deficient in his members.f 

Jablonski has been more fortunate in analyzing 
the name of this god than in most of his etymologi- 
cal conjectures ; and the sense he derives from the 
Coptic etymon agrees exactly with the character 
assigned by Plutarch. It appears from Eratosthenes, 
the first writer who has mentioned Harpocrates, that 
he was called, in the Egyptian language, Phoucrates, 
which only differs in the Greek termination from the 
compound word Phoch-rat, expressing in the Coptic 
" Claudicans pede." Jablonski supposes that Har- 
pocrates is compounded of the same words with the 
prefix ar, denoting the energe tc cause. % It seems 

* Auson. Epist. 25. v. 26. 

t Plutarch calls him dreXrj koc) vytfiov, and again, dv&ifyjpov. 

X Eratosthenes interprets Semphoucrates, by Hercules 
Harpocrates. Sem is the name of Hercules, and Phoucrates 
evidently expresses Harpocrates. In a Greek epigram, cited by 



OF HARPOCRATES. 8f 

to me much more probable that Harpocrates is in 
reality Or-phouc rates, the infant or as yet imperfect 
Horus. 

Cuper, whose learned work contains all that 
can be collected from the ancient writers with refe- 
rence to this god, as well as some interesting details 
on several other parts of the Egyptian mythology, 
conjectures that Harpocrates was a type of the rising 
Sun.* Jablonski contends that he denoted not the 
Sun rising in the East in his diurnal career, but the 
annual rise of that luminary, immediately after he 
has passed the winter-solstice, when his beams are 
as yet weak, and the day has but a short duration. 
This conjecture displays more ingenuity, and rests on 
a better foundation, than that of Cuper. From the 
time of his birth, which was at the winter-solstice, it 
is evident that Harpocrates denoted some circum- 
stance in the state of the seasons at that period; and 
that he had some relation to the Sun, or the solar 
influence, would appear from his near connection or 
from his probable identity with Horus. 

Yet it by no means agrees with the remarks left 
by the old writers concerning Harpocrates, to confine 
his attributes and ideal existence within such narrow 
limits. We have shown that neither Osiris nor 
Horus denoted merely the solar orb, and that Isis 
was not simply the Moon. In like manner we shall 
find that Harpocrates was not merely the globe of 

Jablonski, he is called Amphicrates. Amphicrates, or Am- 
phoucrates, would be the most natural way of writing, in Greek 
letters, Mphoch-rat ; which, in the Coptic orthographv, is 
equivalent to Phoch-rat. 

* Cuper's Harpocrates, Traject. ad Rhen. 1637. 



88 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

the Sun : he seems to have been a type of those 
genial influences which were supposed to reside in 
various departments of nature, but more especially 
in the solar beams, soon after the solstice of winter, 
and to give rise to the first appearances of returning 
spring. 

Thus we are assured by Plutarch, that by this 
infant god the Egyptians represented the first shoot- 
ing up or budding forth of esculent plants.* 

The objects dedicated to Harpocrates tend to 
confirm this notion. He had no sacred animals, as 
the other gods ; but the Egyptians consecrated to him, 
in the month Mesori, the first-fruits of their lugumi- 
nous plants. f The bud, or opening blossom of the 
peach-tree, was also in a peculiar manner sacred to 
Harpocrates. J But there is nothing more common 
in the Egyptian sculpture than the figure of Harpo- 
crates sitting on the flower of the Lotus, or rather of 
the Nymphaea Nelumbo, which expands itself on 
the surface of the water. 

By all these figures, if we may venture to generalise 
them, it would appear that Harpocrates represented 
that power in nature, which fosters the opening of 
buds and the springing up of tender plants. As this 
was an influence supposed to be derived from the 
Sun, fertilizing the Earth, we may account for the 
genealogy of Harpocrates, who was called the off- 
spring of Osiris and Isis, or rather of Serapis and 
Isis. 

* Plutarch de Isid. cap. 68. f Ibid. cap. 65, 68. 

J Ibid. cap. 68. 







* 



C 




OF SARAPIS. 89 

To conclude, it would appear that Harpocrates 
was but faintly distinguished from Horus, of whom 
he seems to have been a particular form. 



OF SARAPIS, OR SERAPIS. 

We now come to a subject which presents greater 
difficulties than most other parts of the Egyptian 
theogony, viz. to the nature and relations of Serapis. 
Sarapis is declared by several authors to be the same 
as Osiris; yet there is evidently some distinction be- 
tween them. What this distinction is we are not able 

satisfactorily' to determine. 

«» 

In the first place, we are assured by Plutarch, who 
indeed repeats the assertion, that Sarapis was Osiris 
himself.* Diodorus makes expressly the same decla- 
ration ; f and in a hymn of Martianus Capella, we 
find both these names assigned to one god. \ 

Te Serapim Nilus, Memphis veneratur Osirim. 

" The Nile invokes thee as Serapis ; Memphis 
worships thee as Osiris." 

The same inference may be drawn from the connec- 
tion of the name of Sarapis with that of I sis. He is 
frequently mentioned by ancient authors as the con- 
sort of this goddess, which shows that they regarded 
Sarapis as another title of Osiris. Diogenes Laertius, 
Clement of Alexandria, § and Macrobius, || to whom we 

* Plutarch, de sid. cap. 28. f Diodor. lib. i. cap. 2. 

% Martian. Capella. Hymn, ad Solem. 

§ Clemens. Strom, v. p. 45. || Macrob. Saturn, lib. i. 

N 



$0 



POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 



might add many other authors, speak of Isis and Sarapis 
as the great divinities of the Alexandrians, or of the 
Egyptians in general. 

Yet the same authors make some distinction between 
Osiris and Sarapis. Thus Plutarch asserts that Sarapis 
was Osiris, after he had changed his nature, or after 
he had passed into the subterranean world ; and it is 
apparently in conformity with this idea, that Diodorus 
calls him the Egyptian Pluto.* Certain it is that Sa- 
rapis was regarded by the Greeks as holding the office 
of Pluto. They were informed, as it seems, by the 
Egyptians, that he was the god who presided over the 
region of the dead ; and Porphyry assigns conjointly 
to him and to Hecate, a particular form of Isis, the su- 
preme rule over maleficent daemons of all descriptions.-)* 

Jablonski, as we have seen, imagined Osiris to denote 
simply the orb of the sun, and this supposition afforded 
him an easy explanation of the nature and distinction 
of Sarapis. The latter, according to this author, re- 
presented the sun in the wintry months, after he had 
passed the autumnal equinox, and had reached the 
latter days of his career, or the solar Osiris, after he 
had entered upon the period of his decrepitude in the 
month of Athyr. Osiris then descended to the shades ; 
it was at this era that he became Sarapis ; the lower 
half of the zodiac was sometimes regarded as the infer- 
nal region by Egyptians, as well as by other nations. 
All these circumstances concur in throwing an air of 
probability over the conjecture of Jablonski. It will 
perhaps appear to most of his readers that this author 

* Cuper. Harp.ocrates p. 85. 

i Porphyr. apud Euseb. Praep. Ev. lib. iv. cap. ult. 



OF SARAPIS. 91 

is not entirely mistaken in his idea respecting the nature 
of Sarapis. It is indeed supported by a passage of 
Porphyry, which has been cited by Eusebius.* Yet as 
Osiris was not simply the sun, during the season when 
that luminary fertilizes the sublunary world, and diffuses 
his rays over the bosom of I sis, but included in his 
attributes other productive powers ; so it must be 
allowed that the same god, after his descent and meta- 
morphosis, was referred, not merely to the Sun in his 
era of decrepitude, but represented also the decline or 
period of suspended vigour in all the genial elements 
of nature. 

The solar Osiris, after he was overcome by Typhon, 
the power of darkness, and shorn of his beams, became 
Sarapis ; and the Nilotic Osiris is probably related in 
a similar manner to the Nilotic Sarapis ; that Sarapis 
was represented by the wintry Nile, now diminished, 
and reduced to his narrow bed, we cannot positively 
affirm, though we are assured that the sacred stream was 
worshipped under the title of Sarapis. f The evidence 
of Suidas, a diligent investigator of antiquit}?, is suffi- 
cient to establish this point. This author informs us 
that Sarapis was supposed to be Jupiter, or the Nile, 
because his statue bore upon its head a vessel of 
measure, and a cubit or instrument for fathoming the 
water. J 

* Vid. Euseb. Prsep.Evang. lib. iii. cap. 11. necnon Cuperi 
Harpocrates, p. 105. 

f Jablonski has very candidly stated the authorities in proof 
of this position, though they are very hostile to his hypothesis. 
He is driven to the awkward expedient of conjecturing that the 
Egyptians had two divinities of the same title. 

{ Suidas in voce Sarapis. 



92 POPULAR RELIGION OP THE EGYPTIANS. 

Jablonski has proved, by the authorities of Socrates 
and Sozomen, that the Nilometer was supposed to be 
under the particular care of Sarapis, and that the in- 
strument, by which the water was fathomed, was always 
conveyed with solemnity to the temple of Sarapis, until 
the Emperor Constantine, on the establishment of 
Christianity, forbade this custom.* 

When we compare all these circumstances, and 
consider that Sarapis was not only the solar god, after 
he had ceased to be the genial principle of nature, 
but that the Nile likewise, belonged to him ; that he 
also presided over Amenthes, or the region of departed 
souls, during the period of their absence when lan- 
guishing without bodies, the instruments of activity ; 
that the dead were deposited in his palace, — we are 
disposed to draw a general inference respecting the 
character of this god, as we have before done with re- 
gard to Osiris. Sarapis seems to represent the pro- 
ductive and indestructible life of nature during that 
period of decline which, in the perpetual vicissitudes 
inherent in all things, disarms it for a while of its 
energy, and holds it in an effete and concealed state, 
until the fated lapse of time shall again call it forth 
into activity. We may thus understand how Sarapis 
rules the Sun, when no longer possessed of genial heat 
and vivid summer-light; and the Nile, during the 
season of its eclipse, and the souls of men, themselves 
originally sparks or emanations from Osiris, as long 
as they remain in the region of inactivity; whence, 
however, as we shall show in the sequel, they were 

* Jablonski Panth. iEgypt. lib iv. cap. 3. — Socrates, Hist. 
Eccles. lib. i. cap. 18. — Sozomen. lib. v. cap. 3. 



OF SARAPIS. 93 

supposed at a certain period to emerge, in order again 
to enter on a scene of active life. 

Osiris and Horns were gods or genii of the whole 
universe. The same pantheistic description is given 
of Sarapis, in a celebrated response made by the 
oracle of this god, to Nicocreon, a Cyprian king, who 
sent messengers to inquire what divinity he ought to 
adore under that name. We shall cite this passage 
chiefly to prove that the sense and attributes assigned 
by Jablonski to Sarapis, are by far too limited. 
The god spoke to the following effect.* 

zi\ki osog roiog 6s [jlolusiv oiov x syco si7ra) 
ovpaviog xao-pog xs^ctTirj, ya.<TTv\Q SI Q<xha(r<roL 3 
yaia Ss (aqi Tro^sg el<ri, tol K oSolt su ouQipi xsirai' 
oju,jU,ct ts rrfhauyeg Xa/^7rpov (pdog tjsX/o/o. 

" My divinity shall be described in the words I 
will now utter. The canopy of heaven is my head ; 
the sea is my belly ; the earth is my feet ; my 
ears are in the etherial region ; and mine eye is the 
resplendent and far-shining lamp of the sun." 

/ 

Sarapis was not only the Pluto of the Egyptians : he 
corresponds also to the Grecian iEsculapius. Indeed 
there seems to be little reason to doubt that the rites 
of iEsculapius were borrowed by the Greeks from the 
worship of the Egyptian Sarapis. The Egyptians 
carried sick persons into his temple, and similar jug- 
gling tricks seem to have been performed by his 
priests, to those of which Aristophanes has given 

* Macrob. Saturn, lib. i. 



U* POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

us a humorous description, in his account of the blind 
man, who passed a night in the fane of iEsculapius.* 
The same animals, viz. the serpent and the cock, 
were appropriated to Sarapis, which are so well known 
in the Grecian fables as symbolical emblems, or con- 
secrated victims of the god of health. We shall find 
occasion to add some further remarks on this subject, 
when we proceed to assemble the principal facts that 
Relate to the worship of animals. 

It is not difficult to understand why Sarapis came 
to be the god of the healing art. We have seen from 
the testimony of Porphyry and Eusebius, that he was 
supposed to preside over the invisible world, and to 
be the ruler of daemons, or maleficent spirits. We 
know that the Egyptians attributed all diseases to the 
agency of daemons, and that their attempts to obtain 
cures were founded, in great part, on magical incan- 
tations, and the various means by which it was sup- 
posed that the invisible beings might be coerced, or 
propitiated. It was natural that they should apply 
chiefly to the god who held, under his controul, the 
agents of evil, or the promoters of all those plagues 
which infest the human body. This, indeed, is pre- 
cisely the point of view in which Porphyry regards 
the relations and offices of the Egyptian Pluto, in his 
double capacity of healer of the infirm, and ruler of 
the dead. 

* iElian. Animal, lib. ii. Tacitus. Histor. lib. iv. cap. 81. 
Aristophanes in Pluto. See below, Bookiv. chap, i, sect. 4. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 









NOTE A. to Sect. I. 

It has been remarked by Jablonski, that the birth of the 
five deities, on the five intercalary days, was a story invented 
for some astronomical purpose, and belonged rather to the 
calendar than to the theology of the Egyptians.* Shuckford f 
and others, who regarded this fable in a different light, have 
argued from it, that the worship of Isis and Osiris was esta- 
blished in Egypt, at the period when the calendar, originally 
consisting of three hundred and sixty days, was corrected by the 
intercalation of five, a change which was effected, according to 
Syncellus, during the reign of Asseth, one of the dynasty of 
shepherd-kings. I can here find no connection between the 
premises and the conclusion. At the time when the astrono- 
mers of Egypt made the addition of five days to the duration 
of their old year, it was certainly more natural for them to 
dedicate those days to deities already admitted into the popu- 
lar worship, than to introduce new divinities into the Egyptian 
theocracy, on purpose to adorn the calendar. It would be 
more reasonable to infer the high antiquity than the recent 
origin of the worship of Osiris from this story; on which, 
however, no reliance can be placed, because we have sufficient 
ground for doubting the assertion of Syncellus, who has given 
us no hint on what authority he has founded it. 

* Jablonski Pantheon iEgypt. lib. ii. eap. 1, p. 143. 
t Shuckford's Connections of Sacred and Profane History, 
vol. 1. 



96 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 



NOTE B. to Sect. I. 

The ancient writers assign various interpretations to the 
name of Osiris, a circumstance which proves that the names 
of the Egyptian gods were derived from a dialect already ob- 
solete at the time when those authors wrote. Jablonski has, 
however, thought it incumbent upon him to trace all these 
interpretations in the modern Coptic. The following are the 
etymologies he assigns to this name. 

1. Osh-iri — Much- operating. This answers to a sense 
assigned by Plutarch. " nparog svspyovv xoc) dyocQoTroibv.'" — 
" Power energetic and beneficent." 

2. Osh-i-re — u The far-journeying king, or, The far- 
journeying sun." This is given by Jablonski as a conjecture 
purely his own. 

3. Hoou-sher — ie Rain-scattering." This etymology is 
supported by a conjectural emendation of Plutarch, who, on 
the authority of Hermeeus, has given opfyipos, as the meaning 
of Osiris. Jablonski thinks we ought to read op£pio$, plurialis, 
rainy, and this sense he represents by the compound Coptic 
word Hoou-sher. Considering the peculiarity of the Egyp- 
tian climate, we must allow that a more improbable conjecture 
could scarcely have been formed. 

4. O-ouje-re — u Author of safety." This is offered as 
corresponding with the interpretation of Iamblichus, who 
construes Osiris, << dyoi^ojv TtoirjriKos :" " Productive of good." 

5. O-ouoEisH-iRr, or, Oeish-iri — " The Cause or Author 
of Time." This is the interpretation which Jablonski delibe- 
rately prefers, and on which he chiefly founds his hypothesis 
respecting the original character of Osiris. Yet it is a sense 
which is not expressly assigned by any ancient writer to the 
name of this god. It is indeed mentioned by Hermapion, as 
cited by Ammianus, to be the attribute of Horus; but this 
circumstance is by no means favourable to the scheme of 
Jablonski. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 9? 

After all, it seems that this author has failed to discover 
any Coptic etymon corresponding with the only sense which 
Plutarch and Diodorus agree in assigning to the name of 
Osiris, viz. " The many -eyed god." This deficiency has been 
supplied by the learned French antiquarian, who has bestowed 
so much labour on the Rosetta inscription. But M. Silvestre 
de Sacy finds it necessary, in the first place, to change Osiris 
into Osinis. This last word he derives from Osh, much, and 
Nau, to see. So much for the theories founded on etymology. 
-^See Jablonski Pantheon iEgypt. lib. i. p. 150. et seq. item 
Opuscul. torn, i, p. 188. M. Silvestre de Sacy, Lett, sur 
^Inscription de Rosette. 



NOTE B. to Sect. II. 

It must, however, be observed, that Eudoxus is censured by 
the astronomer Geminus of Rhodes, for having supposed that 
the festival of Isis corresponded constantly with one period of 
the year; whereas, according to Geminus, being connected 
with the vague year of the Egyptians, it must have traversed 
successively the whole circle of the seasons. But the autho- 
rity of Geminus does not deserve to be set in opposition to 
that of Eudoxus, who is said (Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 554,) to have 
resided thirteen years in Egypt in the society of the philoso- 
phers of that country, and is well known to have applied 
himself diligently to the investigation of their astronomy. He 
could not, therefore, be ignorant of the principles on which 
their calendar was constructed. Various attempts have been 
made by the learned to reconcile the statements of these two 
astronomers. Jablonski (Nova Interp.Tab.Isiac.) supposes that 
there were two festivals of Isis, one of which only was fixed at 
the solstice, and that Geminus was unacquainted with this 
circumstance, and referred exclusively to one of them. It is, 
however, very probable, that the customs of the Egyptians 
with respect to their calendar had undergone innovations 
Vfore the time of Geminus, and, on account of his higher 

o 



98 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 

antiquity and general reputation, the authority of Eudoxus is 
certainly to be preferred. 

The conjectures of M. de Humboldt (Rdcherches Americ.) 
that the Egyptians, like the Romans, had conceptive as well 
as stative festivals, appears very probable. If this be allowed, 
it must be supposed that the festivals to which Eudoxus, 
Plutarch, and others, connect physical interpretations, were 
conceptive; that is, that they were not fixed in the vague 
calendar, but announced by the priests at the return of par- 
ticular seasons, and that Geminus was only acquainted with 
the stative festivals, which being associated with certain dates 
in the vague Egyptian calendar, must have traversed succes- 
sively all the seasons. These, of course, could receive no 
physical explanation. 

NOTE C. to Sect. II. 

The following account of the great Persian festivals reminds 
us of these general reflections of Plutarch. " Their chief 
festivals," says Mr. Richardson, " were those about the equi- 
noxes ; the next were those of water at midsummer, and of 
fire at the winter-solstice. The first was the Norooz, which 
commenced with their year in March, and lasted six days, 
during which, all ranks seem to have participated in one 
general joy. The rich sent presents to the poor; all were 
dressed in their holiday-clothes, and all kept open houses ; 
and religious processions, music, dancing, a species of thea- 
trical exhibition, rustic sports, and other pastimes, presented a 
continued round of varied amusement. Even the dead and 
the ideal things were not forgotten ; rich viands being placed 
on the tops of houses and high towers, on the flavour of 
which the Peris and spirits of their departed heroes and friends 
were supposed to feast."* 

The Norooz or vernal festival is celebrated by the Persians, 
though unconnected with the religion now prevalent. It 

* Richardson's Dissertation, p. 184. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 99 

commences when the Sun just enters Aries, and lasts three 
days.* 



NOTE D. to Sect. II. 

The period of the year in which the festival in celebration 
of the discovery of Osiris was solemnized by the Egyptians, is 
a point involved in great perplexity. We are not possessed of 
sufficient data to determine it beyond the reach of controversy ; 
different opinions, indeed, have been maintained among the 
learned in modern times on this subject. On one side we find 
Scaliger and Selden, and on the other, Jablonski.f 

It appears to me, that although the precise date of this 
festival cannot be determined with absolute certainty, yet there 
are several considerations which render it extremely probable 
that it took place soon after the winter-solstice. 

1. It seems evident, from the context of the passage in 
which Plutarch mentions this ceremony, that he cannot have 
intended to represent it as happening on the nineteenth day of 
the month Athyr, and that some error must have crept into 
the text as it now stands. For this author had just remarked 
that the mourning for the Aphanism or loss of Osiris, began 
on the seventeenth of that month, and occupied the three 
succeeding days. The rejoicing for the re-appearance of the 
god must certainly have been subsequent to the last of these 
four days, which were spent by the Egyptians in grief and 
lamentation. It cannot be supposed that it occurred on the 
nineteenth, which was one of the days devoted to the sorrow- 
ful exhibitions just described. As we therefore cannot learn 
from this passage of Plutarch what was the time for celebrat- 
ing the discovery of Osiris, we must endeavour to determine 
it from other considerations. 

* Morier's Journey through Persia, p. 206. 

f Selden de Diis Syriis. syntagm. i. cap. 4. Scaliger de Emen- 
datione Temporum, lib. ii. p. 70. Jablonski Nova Interpretatio 
Tabulae Isiacee. Opuscula, torn. ii. 



100 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 

2. The festivals connected with the adventures of Isis and 
Osiris appear to have followed, in other respects, the order of 
the occurrences mentioned in the legend. By observing this 
order we are therefore likely to obtain some hints respecting 
the succession of the festivals and ceremonies. It is probable 
that the three festivals connected respectively with the loss of 
Osiris, the search after him, and the discovery, followed each 
other in the order in which we have mentioned them. But 
we are assured that the festival commemorating the Search 
took place about the winter-solstice; therefore the Discovery 
was probably subsequent to that period. 

3. On the seventh of the month called Tybi, which day 
answers to the second of January, the Egyptians held a festi- 
val celebrating the arrival of Isis in Egypt after her voyage to 
Phcenice. This must have taken place either immediately 
before or soon after the Search. The second of January is 
indeed later than the solstice; but we are not sure that the 
Search was celebrated exactly on the solstitial term. It is 
indeed observed by Jablonski, that Ptolemy has marked the 
eleventh of Tybi, or the sixth of January, as the period of 
mid-winter, and that on that day the Grecian festivals in 
honour of Bacchus, which we know to have been derived from 
the rites of the Egyptians, were generally held. Hence he 
coje ctures, not without some reason, that the Search was 
commemorated in Egypt on that day. However this may 
have been, it is not improbable that this festival was held a 
few days after the solstice, though connected with it in the 
chronology of the year. In this case it may have happened 
subsequently to the arrival of Isis on the seventh Tybi. 

If the Search really preceded the seventh Tybi, it must be 
supposed to have referred to the voyage of Isis in pursuit of 
the ark in which Osiris was enclosed. But if it was subse- 
quent to that date, it referred to the expedition of Isis, when 
she sailed in a boat of papyrus over the fenny parts of the 
country, seeking and collecting the scattered remains of her 
husband's body. And this seems to be the meaning of the 
terms in which Plutarch mentions the incidents of the legend, 
and the rites that commemorated them. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 101 

If the former hypothesis be adopted, viz. that the solstitial 
festival entitled the Search referred to the voyage of Isis to 
Phcenice, still the Discovery must have been connected with 
the later events of the legend. For it could scarcely intervene 
between the solstice and the seventh Tybi, as it necessarily 
would, if referred to the former train of incidents. Besides, 
the Phallic institution, which, as we have seen, was connected 
with the finding of the scattered members of the god, seems 
to prove that the festival of the Discovery referred to this latter 
event. Therefore if we suppose, as we have reason to do 
from all the data that remain, that these Egyptian festivals 
followed the order of adventures recorded in the legend, it 
appears that the E uresis, or rejoicing for the discovery of the 
god, took place at some period subsequently to the seventh 
Tybi, and probably by a considerable space later in the year. 

4. In all the accounts we have of this solemnity in celebra- 
tion of the Discovery of Osiris, we find it connected with a 
procession relating to the appearance of Harpocrates; and we 
are told expressly by Plutarch, that the festivals connected 
with the birth and infancy of this god were celebrated in the 
interval between the winter-solstice and the vernal equinox. 
On one of these occasions, a little image was carried forth, 
representing Harpocrates, dressed up in a peculiar manner. 
Lactantius speaks of this ceremony as follows : i( Isidi iEgyp- 
tia sacra sunt quatenus filium parvulum vel perdiderit vel 
invenerit. Nam primo sacerdotes ejus deglabrato corpore 
sua pectora tundunt, lamentantur, sicut ipsa, cum perdidit 
fecerat. Deinde puer introducitur, quasi inventus, et in 
lsetitiam luctus ille mutatur."* And Claudian seems to allude 
to the same ceremony in the following verses : 

" Sic numina Memphis 
In vulgus proferre solet. Penetralibus exit 
Effigies, brevis ilia quidem; sed plurimus infra 
Liniger imposito suspirat veste sacerdosj 
Testatur sudore deum/'f 

* Lactant. lib. i. cap. 2. 
f Claudian. de Quarto Consulat. Honorii, v. 569. 



102 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 

The description of these rites so nearly resembles the ac- 
count which Plutarch has given us of the Discovery of Osiris, 
that there seems to be sufficient reason for concluding that 
they relate to the same festival ; and if this be allowed, the 
period for celebrating the Discovery must have been at some 
time between the winter-solstice and the vernal equinox. 

5. Macrobius and several other authors, above cited, ex- 
pressly affirm, that all the ceremonies of a joyful description 
were held in the spring. This is besides implied in what is 
said respecting the resemblance of the Egyptian and Syrian 
rites. What relation, in a physical sense, could the Discovery 
of Osiris bear to the rejoicings for the revival of Adonis, if 
they were not both celebrated in the same season ? We know 
that the latter toot place at the vernal equinox; and the 
author who informs us of this fact, and founds upon it an 
explanation before cited, immediately subjoins that the 
Egyptian rites respecting Osiris were a counterpart in their 
physical allusions to the Syrian honours of Adonis. 

In order to render what has been said respecting the seasons 
of the Egyptian festivals more intelligible, we shall add a Table 
of the Calendar, with the dates of the principal solemnities. 



COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 



103 



TABULAR VIEW OF THE CALENDAR. 

1st of Thoth corresponded with August 29. 

1st of Phaophi . . . .Sept. 28 Time of sowing. Burial of 

Osiris. Isis is now pregnant 
of Harpocrates, who is born 
when the green herbage first 
springs. 

1st of Athyr Oct. 28 

17th Aphanism or Disappear- 
ance of Osiris. 
Voyage of Isis. 

1st of Choiak Nov. 28 

IstofTybi Dec. 27 

7th Return of Isis to Egypt. 

Search for the remains of 
Osiris about the Solstice. 

(Uncertain date.) Discovery of the remains 

of Osiris. 

1st of Mechir Jan. 26 

1st of Phamenoth . .Feb. 25 

At the New Moon Osiris 
enters into that planet, 
and fecundates the sublu- 
nary world. Beginning 
of Sprirag. 

1st of Pharmuthi . .March 27 About the beginning of this 

month the purification of Isis 
was celebrated. 

1st of Pachon April 26 

1st of Payni ..... .May 26 

IstofEpiphi June 25 

1st of Mechir July 25 

5 Intercalary days. 



104 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER II. 

The Egyptians avoided intercalation, and the calendar, 
therefore, went back through the signs at the rate of one day 
in every fourth year. Of course at the end of a Sothiacal 
period, which comprehended 4 + 365 — 1460 years, the 
commencement of the first month, Thoth, was found to have 
returned to the same place, or it had gone back through the 
whole circle of the signs. After the battle of Actium, the 
Egyptian astronomers adopted the method of intercalating, 
and their year became from this time fixed.* The com- 
mencement of the year and of the month Thoth was then 
coincident with the twenty-ninth of August, or St. John 
Baptist's day, and this is the plan we have exhibited. 

As Plutarch wrote subsequently to this alteration, when the 
festivals, which were probably in early times shifted from month 
to month according to the variation of the calendar and the 
discrepancies between the vague year and the seasons, had 
now become fixed, we may easily understand why he connects 
them with particular days in the calendar. 

* Petavii. Ration. Temp, part ii. lib. i. c. 13. 



CHAPTER III. 

OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS 

SECTION I. 

Of some Emblematical Representations of the Sun. 

Owing to the frequent recurrence of the figures of 
animals, and similar objects, in the Egyptian sculp- 
tures and symbolical representations,, we incur a 
danger of confounding forms that were merely 
intended as types or emblems of the elements,, or 
the departments of nature, with the figures of the 
gods, or of the divine animals. What adds to 
this difficulty is, that we have reason to suspect that 
several of the ancient writers have fallen into errors, 
not being aware of this distinction. 

The Egyptians had several methods of represent- 
ing by symbols the progress of the sun, and the 
changes of the seasons. They figured the Sun, or 
rather the Day, under the emblem of a new-born 
infant, at the winter-solstice, and as passing during 
the year through all the stages of life, until towards 
the return of winter he became old and effete. We 
obtain this information from Macrobius, who says, 
cc that the figures of Bacchus or Liber Pater, repre- 
sented various ages, some having the form of boy- 
hood, others of youth, while some were bearded like 
adult men, and others bore the aspect of decrepid 
age. These diversities, of age," he adds, " are re- 
ferred to the Sun, who is painted in the figure of a 

p 



106 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

little infant at the winter-solstice, when the days are 
shortest; but the length of the days increasing, he 
acquires at the vernal equinox the vigour of a youth, 
and is typified accordingly by that emblem. After- 
wards we find the age of perfect manhood marked by 
a long beard, and this form relates to the summer- 
solstice, at which season the Sun has acquired his 
greatest power. At length, when the days diminish, 
he is represented in a fourth form, in that of an old 
and decrepid man."* 

It is true that Macrobius here mentions the various 
figures of Bacchus ; but these representations bear no 
reference to the Egyptian history of Osiris, or to any 
forms of worship. The images he describes seem, 
on the contrary, to belong to the symbolical delineation 
or picture-writing of the Egyptians ; and Macrobius 
was probably mistaken in confounding them with the 
figures associated with religious rites and fables. 

Plutarch mentions a festival bearing some allusion 
to these representations. He says, ec upon the twenty- 
second of Phaophi, after the autumual equinox, the 
Egyptians celebrate the staves, or crutches of the Sun, 
intimating, that as the sun is at that time receding 
from us, and in an oblique position, his heat and light 
begin to grow weaker, and that he therefore stands in 
need of support and subsidiary strength. "f 

Other modes of transforming the type of the sun, 
according to the changes of the year, were occasionally 
adopted. A figure with painted wings denoted the 
sun, and the wings were of different colours, ac- 
cording as the emblem represented that luminary, in 

* Macrob. Sat. lib. i. 
f Plut. Isid et Osir. cap. 52. 



HYPOTHESIS OF JABLONSKI. 107 

the upper or lower half of the zodiac. In the upper 
hemisphere, the sun had wings of a brilliant hue ; but 
in the wintry months., or during his infernal course, 
he was painted with pinions of a dark blue colour.* 

We are also informed by Porphyry, that " the sun 
was represented as undergoing a change of form in 
each of the twelve signs ; or as transmuting* himself 
into the figure of the zodion or animal, which corres- 
ponded with each of the twelve departments of the 
zodiac/'f 

It does not appear that these transfigurations bore 
any reference to the worship of the Egyptian gods. 
They certainly have no apparent connection with 
the history of Isis and Osiris, as detailed in the 
mythologue;J and, if I mistake not, a want of attention 
to this circumstance has given rise to erroneous 
theories respecting a considerable part of the Egyptian 
superstition. 



SECTION II. 

Of the hypothesis of Jablonski, and some other writers, 
respecting Sarapis, Harpocrates, Horus, Jupiter Ammon 9 
Hercules, and Pan. 

These symbolical figures, particularly the meta- 
morphoses which the type of the sun is said to have 

* Macrob. Sat. lib. i. 

f Porphyr. Epist. ad Annebon. praefix. Iamblicli. de Myst. 
iEgypt. 

X The only exception to this remark is the story that Har- 
pocrates was born at the solstice ; but this may be a casual 
coincidence : at any rate it affords no foundation for the system 
about to be considered. 



108 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

undergone in the Egyptian calendar, as it assumed the 
forms of the zodiacal emblems, have given occasion 
to a celebrated hypothesis respecting several of the 
Egyptian divinities. It happens that several of the 
zodiacal figures represent animals which were sacred 
to particular gods. The ram was the sacred animal 
of Amnion, or the Egyptian Jupiter. The ram is also 
one of the twelve signs, or zodia. Hence it is easy to 
conjecture that Amnion is only the Sun metamor- 
phosed into the form of the sign Aries. On similar 
principles, many parts of the Egyptian mythology 
have been converted into a system of astronomical 
allusions. 

Among the moderns, Kircher* and Basnagef 
seem to have had glimpses of this method of interpre- 
tation. According to Basnage, the Persian Mithra, 
whom he supposes to be copied from the Egyptian 
Osiris, riding upon a bull, denoted the Sun in the 
sign Taurus. But Jablonski had systematized these 
notions, and built an ingenious theory, which extends 
to a great part of the Egyptian mythology, on the 
foundation of a few obscure hints, connected together 
by the aid of plausible conjectures and Coptic etymo- 
logies. Among the various forms which the signs of 
the zodiac, and the different ages of the sun present, 
he has found places for most of the Egyptian gods. 

I have already mentioned the general conclusions 
which I am inclined to draw respecting some of these 
divinities ; others remain to be treated of in the 
sequel. I shall now briefly notice the ideas which 

* See Kircher's Tempi. Isiac. 

f Basnage, Hist, des Juifs. liv. iii. chap. 18. 



HYPOTHESIS OF JABLONSKI. 109 

Jablonski has entertained,, with respect to the offices 
and relations of those which he refers to the Sun and 
the zodiacal signs. 

1. The infant Harpocrates was born about the sol- 
stice of winter. Harpocrates is therefore, according to 
Jablonski, the Sun represented as an infant in the first 
stage of his progress, when the days are yet short, and 
the heat and light defective. This is the best sup- 
ported of Jablonski's conjectures, and rests upon some 
striking coincidences. Harpocrates, indeed, as being 
connected with the story of Isis and Osiris, certainly 
bears some relation to the Sun and the progress of 
the seasons, though there is nothing to prove our 
authors particular explanation. 

2. Jupiter was worshipped at Thebes in the form 
of a ram, or of a human figure with a ram's head. 
Amnion therefore represents the Sun in the sign 
Aries. 

3. Hercules is supposed to be the sun after the 
equinox, when he has acquired strength. This conjec- 
ture is only supported by an etymology of the Egyptian 
name of Hercules, which Jablonski derives, with great 
probability, from Jom } meaning strength or power. 

4. Horus. A place is secured for Horus among the 
zodiacal animals, on the authority of a passage of 
Horapollo, who says, ie that lions were placed under 
the throne of Horus, to express a certain symbolical 
relation between that animal and the god." Horus is 
accordingly conjectured to be the Sun in the sign 
Leo, when, about the solstice of summer, he has 
acquired his full vigour. 

5. Mendes, or Pan, was worshipped in the form of a 
goat. In this instance, Jablonski seems to desert his 



110 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

principle of interpretation, and, instead of seeking a 
place for Pan in the zodiac,* he refers this god to the 
generative influences of the solar beams. 

6. The Sun, in the latter part of his career, was 
represented, as we have seen, by the form of a de- 
crepid old man. This reminds our author of Serapis. 
Serapis, with him, is the wintry sun, or the sun in the 
three last months of the year. On this subject we 
have treated in the foregoing pages. 

The chief authority on which Jablonski relies for 
the support of these conjectures is a fragment pre- 
served by Macrobius, and considered by that writer 
as a response of the oracle of Apollo, at Claros. 
This passage seems to connect the several parts of 
our author's hypothesis. It is as follows : 

<Ppa£sO TOU TTOLUloiU U7TOLT0V 6 SOU SfJL[JLSU 'IdtCO, 

yei^ari \ksu r AtdTjy, Ala. r siapog ap-^o^suoio, 
'HsXiov Zs dspsus, (AST07rwpou K aSpov 'Iaai. 

" Declare Iao to be supreme over all the gods, 
who in the winter is Pluto; Jupiter in the be- 
ginning of the spring ; the Sun in the summer, and 
in autumn the tender or infant Iao." 

With respect to this fragment it must be observed 
that Macrobius has given no hint, and that there is 
no internal proof of its bearing any reference to the 

* He might have found authority in support of this notion ; 
for Hyginus affirms that Pan, in order to escape the persecu- 
tion of Typhon, assumed the fore-parts of a goat, and the 
tail of a fish ; that is, that he became the sign of Capricorn. — 
Hygin. Poet. Astron. lib. ii. cap. 28. This is a more per- 
fect coincidence than any of those adduced by Jablonski. 



HYPOTHESIS OF JABLONSKI. Ill 

Egyptian mythology. Indeed the name lao, which 
is the Greek way of writing the Hebrew Tetragram- 
maton, affords a clear proof that the passage was a 
forgery of some sect of Christian heretics ; and 
Jablonski himself admits it to be a fragment of 
Gnostic mysticism.* On this account it is unworthy 
of credit. But even if it were allowed to be of the 
highest authority , it would only support two of the 
explanations above mentioned, which it directly con- 
tradicts one of them : the circumstance of the infant 
god ruling the autumnal season is irreconcilable 
with Jabionski's system. 

But an objection to this hypothesis which has, in 
my opinion, much greater weight than any of the 
arguments which are forced into its support, arises 
from the testimony of the Greeks, who uniformly 
assure us that the Egyptian Jupiter, Pan, Hercules, 
Apollo, and other gods, coincide with the Grecian 
divinities of the same names. Now, though we allow 
that the resemblance was probably not perfect or 
uniform, still there must have been a general con- 
gruity, at least in the most striking attributes. But 
Jablonski's theory leaves not even the most remote 
analogy between the gods of the Greeks, and those 
of Egypt, whom the former people looked upon as 
the prototypes of their own theocracy. 

* The name law occured often in the mystical emblems of 
the Gnostics. Fabretti has published an Abraxas, with this 
inscription " law A£ova» EAwai AS^aga^," surrounding the figure 
of a serpent, with Anubis on the reverse. See Basnage, Hist. 
des Juifs. liv. iii. chap. 26. on the Cabbala of the Christian 
heretics. The AZpbs law, or " Infant Jehovah/' is evidently 
neither Harpocrates nor Serapis. 



112 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

I shall conclude my remarks on this subject, by 
collecting a few scattered hints relating to the 
Egyptian Jupiter, Hercules, and Pan ; which, how- 
ever, are too scanty to afford a satisfactory elucidation 
of the precise character and attributes assigned to 
them in this system of mythology. 



SECTION III. 

Ammon, or the Egyptian Jupiter. 

ec The Egyptians," says Herodotus, Ci call Jupiter, 
Ammoun." This was the god worshipped in the 
Theban Nome, the capital of which was accordingly 
called by the Greeks, Diospolis. All the Greek 
writers are so unanimous in declaring this god to be 
the Zeus, or Jove, of their own mythology,* that we 
cannot but believe that a striking analogy subsisted 
between the African and the European Jupiter. We 
are expressly assured that the worship of Jupiter was 
introduced into Greece from Egypt, and the Olym- 
pian Jove still maintained his connection with the 
banks of the Nile ; for Homer sends him occasionally 
to a festival in Ethiopia. 

Zsvg yap stt ajxeavov [jlst a^^ovag AlSi07rrjoLg 
X0*£o£ sftj [xsra Neurol,' Qsol ft oi^a iravrsg eVoVTO.*)* 

(e Jupiter went yesterday on the ocean to the 
feast of the blameless ^Ethiopians, and the com- 
pany of gods followed his procession/' 

* Herodotus, lib. ii. cap. 42. Plut. de Isid. et Osir. Diodor. 
lib. i. cap. 1. Iamblich. de Myst. iEgyptiorum, sect. viii. c. S. 
f Iliad. A. v. 423. 



AMMON, OR THE EGYPTIAN JUPITER. 113 

Homer seems here to refer to a ceremony that was 
practised by the inhabitants of the Thebaid, of 
which Diodorus and Eustathius give us a particular 
account.* The statue of the Theban Jupiter was 
carried up the Nile every year, with a splendid pro- 
cession, into Ethiopia, or, as it is probably meant, to 
a temple of the same god at Meroe. There he was 
received with great pomp, and at length returned to 
Egypt, after honouring with his presence the annual 
festival of the Ethiopians or Meroites. It is therefore 
plain, that Homer considered Jupiter as the same 
with Ammon, or the god of Diospolis. 

The Greek interpretations of the name Ammon 
throw no light upon his nature. According to 
Manethon, Ammon, or Amoun, meant "concealed, or 
concealment ;" but Hecataeus said, that the Egyptians 
used this word when they called each other;" and 
Plutarch adds, cc that this invocation was uttered to the 
chief god, whom they identify with the universe itself, 
calling on him, and entreating him, as if invisible and 
concealed, to make himself manifest/' f Ammon, 
therefore, according to these writers, seems to have 
meant the Spirit of the universe, which was supposed 
to be invisible in its nature, but was perhaps imagined, 
like other objects of Egyptian superstition, to be 
subject to the power of incantation, £ and to present 
itself sometimes in a defined shape to the eyes of 
the magician. § 

* Diod. lib. ii. p. 88. Eustath. in Iliad. A. p. 128. 

t Plut. Isid. cap. 9. J See Iamblichus de Myst. ^Egypt. 

§ It was believed that, by certain religious acts it was in 
the power of mortals to obtain a visible perception of the 
celestial beings. See the extracts from the works of Manethon, 
in the latter part of this volume. 



114 OP THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

This idea of the nature of Amnion coincides with 
the testimony of Diodorus, who professes to borrow 
kis accounts from Egyptian writers; that is, from 
Egyptians of the Ptolemaic age, who wrote in 
Greek. Me informs us, that the Egyptian philoso- 
phers reckoned five elements, adding to the four com- 
monly enumerated, one which they termed tC 7rvsrj[xa/' 
or spirit. This is the same as the celestial aether of 
the Greeks, which was supposed to fill the highest 
regions of the heavens. Hence a quickening or en- 
livening influence was supposed by the Egyptians to 
be derived into all animated creatures. This vital 
aether, or principle of life, was called, according to 
Diodorus, Jupiter or Ammon. 

Iamblichus gives a similar interpretation of the 
name of this god, though he involves it in the phrase- 
ology of the later Platonic school, from which it is 
necessary to divest all his statements, before we can 
derive instruction from them. He tells us, " that the 
demiurgus or creator, as he proceeds to the work of 
generation, and developes the occult powers of his 
reasons or designs, is called Ammon/'* 

Such are the scanty notices we can collect concern- 
ing Ammon. If we suppose these authors to be cor- 
rect, (and their agreement seems to establish their cre- 
dibility) we can understand how this god was identified 
by the Greeks with Jupiter, the invisible god of the 
firmament, who sometimes manifests himself by light- 
ning and other meteoric phaenomena. But Jablonski's 
idea, that Ammon was the Sun in Aries, is not only 
at variance with all the authorities cited above, but 

* Iamblich. sect. viii. cap. S. 



THE EGYPTIAN HERCULES. 115 

affords no sort of relation between the Egyptian god 
and the Greek'deity, to whom oracles and shrines were 
said to have been erected by votaries of the Theban 
Jove. It may be worth while also to remark, that 
the season when Jablonski supposes the Sun to have 
been worshipped under the name of Amnion,, viz. 
about the vernal equinox, was the period when the 
most joyful festivities were celebrated in honour of 
Osiris, who was then invoked as the being who resi- 
ded in the solar orb, and thence diffused his fertilizing 
rays through the sublunary world.* At this very 
season, when Osiris was chiefly worshipped in the 
Sun, it is improbable that Ammon was adored as the 
daemon of the same luminary. 



SECTION VI. 

The Egyptian Hercules. 

Hercules was one of the twelve native deities of 
Egypt, and bore no relation, except perhaps a casual 
resemblance, to the Grecian demi-god, the son of 
Alcmena. Cicero calls him the offspring of the Nile. 

Jablon ski's etymology of the Egyptian name of 
Hercules is one of the most satisfactory that occur in 

* There is, indeed, a coincidence in the bodily form of 
Ammon and the figure of the sign; but it is fully as probable 
that the asterism was named after and copied from the Theban 
ram, as that the Theban ram was worshipped as a type of the 
constellation. 



116 



OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 



the whole of his work. It appears from Eratosthenes 
that this god was in Egypt called SEM; and Pytha- 
goras interpreted Hercules, cc tt}v ouvapw rijg q>6o-£ws," 
the power or energy of nature. Power or strength 
is, in the Coptic, Jom or Dsom ; and this word appears 
to be the etymon of the Egyptian name of Hercules. 
But in this instance, though the attempt to interpret 
the name is successful, it has led the author but a 
short way towards his conclusion respecting the 
attribute of the god. 

Jablonski conjectures that Hercules was the Sun 
after he has passed the vernal equinox, and that the 
same luminary, when he arrives at the summer-sol- 
stice, became Horus or Apollo. Dupuis, who adopts 
the same hypothesis in general respecting the 
Egyptian gods, reverses, in this case, the conjecture 
of Jablonski, and supposes the vernal Sun to have 
been Apollo, and the solstitial Hercules. This may 
serve to show on how slippery a foundation the whole 
scheme of these authors has been erected. 

There are, however, some passages of the mytho- 
logic writers, which indicate an obscure relation 
between the rites of Hercules and the solar worship. 
Plutarch says, " the Egyptians supposed that Hercules 
was seated in the Sun and moved round the world in 
company with that celestial body." And Macrobius 
informs us, " that the religious ceremonial of the 
Egyptians expressed, by multiplied rites, the multiplied 
powers of the divinity, and signified that Hercules was 
the Sun that exists in all and through all." From these 
observations it might be conjectured, that the power 
pf solar attraction or gravitation was figured under the 
type of Hercules, if such an idea did not appear too 



THE EGYPTIAN HERCULES. 117 

refined and philosophical.* The theorists, however, of 
the Orphic school, who derived all their dogmas from 
Egypt, designated by Hercules the efficient cause in 
nature, which they imagined to distribute the universe 
into its different parts, and to perform those opera- 
tions which depend upon gravitation. This appears 
from a passage of Athenagoras : se Water was," ac- 
cording to Orpheus, Ci the principle of all things ; from 
the subsiding of water, mud was produced; and from 
both these elements, an animal in the figure of a 
Dragon with a Lion's head, the middle of whose body 
expressed that form of the deity which is called Hercules 
and Time. From Hercules an egg of immense mag- 
nitude was produced, which having become full, and 
undergoing incubation, was broken by the same being 
who had brought it forth, and distributed into two 
parts ; the upper portion formed the Heaven, and the 
lower one the Earth." The distribution of the elements 
is ascribed to the power of Hercules. 

The emblems which enter into the compound form 
of Hercules, according to this description of Athena- 
goras, are those which denote physical power or 
strength. Such is the probable etymology of his name ; 
and his office was to uphold the distribution of the 
universe. 

* This sense might be affixed to the invocation of Nonnus, 
an Egyptian poet : 

Atrrpo^ircuv Hpocx\s$ t ava£ itvpog, op^a^s xocf^s 
HeA<£ ZpO'T'soio Glov SoXi^oamls rfoipyjv, 
tlukXov aysis peta xvkXcv. 

u Starry-robed Hercules, king of fire, who 
settest in array the universe : thou Sun, &c. who 
revolvest circle after circle." 



118 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

All that we know of the Egyptian Hercules is, that 
his attribute was strength or power. We may hence 
conjecture, that those phsenomena in nature which 
present the most striking appearances of power and 
energy were ascribed to him, and first suggested the 
existence of this imaginary agent. 

It is easy to understand why the Egyptians, who 
established their rites among the Pelasgi, chose to 
identify their Hercules, or god of strength, with 
the story of a Grecian hero, famous for the exploits 
which distinguish a barbarous chieftain. The labours 
of the Boeotian Hercules were adventures of this class; 
and yet it is possible that their number, and some of 
their connections, might be subsequently arranged,, 
with reference to the twelve signs of the Zodiac. 
Porphyry gives this explanation of the labours of 
Hercules, and the same idea occurs in a verse attri- 
buted to Orpheus : 

Awfisx car o.vtq'Kiwv &XP 1 ^v&ftwv a#Aa ^isprrayu. 

(i Advancing through his twelve labours from 
the east to the west."* 

It appears that Jupiter, or Ammon, denoted the vital 
force that moves and enlivens animated bodies. So 
it would seem that by Hercules was expressed the 
power which arranges and distributes the parts of 

* Dupuis has written an elaborate commentary on this 
passage, which displays much ingenuity, though, perhaps, it 
is not likely to convince many persons of the truth of the 
author's hypothesis. The reader may see an abstract of it in 
the British Review, vol. 8, p. 370. Dupuis has taken it, 
without acknowledgement, from Court de Gebelin's Monde 
Primitif. 



THE EGYPTIAN PAN. 119 

inanimate nature, which actuates and directs the 
movements of those great masses, whose locomotion 
excites the idea of prodigious strength. The Egyp- 
tian Hercules was, perhaps, originally the same as 
Atlas, who was himself an African deity, the god of 
strength, or of that energy in nature that upholds the 
world, or, as others say, that supports the pillars orr 
which the universal fabric rests. 

xiov oupavou rs xcCi %$ovog 
o)[j.oig Ipzi&ov, ap/#o£ ovx euayxaXou.* 

" Supporting on his shoulders the vast pillars 

Of heaven and earthy a weight of cumbrous grasp."f 



SECTION V. 

Pan. 

Pan was one of the eight gods who constituted the 
first or most ancient rank of the Egyptian deities. He 
was worshipped in the Mendesian nome, under the 
form of a he-goat, and gave his name to the city of 
Mendes.J Of the abominations that were practised 
in honour of this god, we shall have another occasion 
to speak. At present we are only interested in his 
office or attributes. 

* iEschyli. Prometh. Vinct. 

f Potter's Translation of iEschylus. 

\ Herod, lib. ii. cap. 46. Suidas in voce Msvtys. A great 
number of passages, referring to the worship of Mendes, are 
collected by Bochart, in his Hierozoicon, part i. lib. ii. c. 43. 



120 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

Ou this subject there is no obscurity. Suidas says, 
that the goat was worshipped ec mg avaxL^svov rij 
yovlfxcp Suvdt<u,sr oj/eutixov yap to %(Sov." The same idea 
is assigned as the origin of these rites, by Diodorus 
Siculus,* Horapollo,f and Nonnus, cited by Gregory 
Nazianzen.J It is therefore undoubted, that Pan, 
among the Egyptians, typified the power of animal 
reproduction, or was the daemon who was supposed to 
preside over that process by which all the species of 
living creatures are perpetuated. The idea which 
occasioned the form of the goat to be selected as a 
symbol of this quality, is sufficiently obvious. The 
Greeks give a similar explanation of the figure 
attributed to the Grecian Pan. § 

The worship of Mendes was confined to the Men- 
desian nome; but there was a city in Upper Egypt, 
which the Greeks also called Panopolis. This was 
the city which the Egyptians termed Chemmis, or 
Chemmo, and Diodorus interpreted its name, "the city 
of Pan/' This was not, however, the same Pan that 
was worshipped at Mendes. The latter had a form 
resembling that of Priapus, and held in his hand the 
whip of Osiris or Horns. In the account which 
Stephanus gives of the god of Panopolis, || we 

* Diod. Bibl. lib. i. p. 78. f Hieroglyph, lib. ii. c. 28. 

X Collect. Hist, ad Greg. Invectivas. See the authorities 
cited by Bochart. loc. cit. and by Jablonski, 

§ See Phurnut. de Nat. Deor. de Pane. Hymn. Orphic ad 
Panem. 

|| Stephan. Byzant. voce Uavog iroXig. This author describes 
the statue of Pan in almost the same terms which Plutarch 
adopts in describing the figure of Osiris. He says, 'E<rti xa\ 



PAPREMIS, THE EGYPTIAN MARS. 121 

recognise Osiris in one of his principal characters. As 
Boubastis and Eilithyia occupy one of the offices of 
Isis, so we find Mendes possessed of an attribute 
which is elsewhere consigned to Osiris ; and it seems 
to be evident, that the idol of Chemmis was only Osiris 
or Horus, in the function which is proper to both of 
them, viz. as presiding over animal generation. It is 
not difficult to understand why the Greeks confounded 
him with the god to whom this attribute particularly 
belonged.* 



SECTION VI. 

PapremiSy the Egyptian Mars, 

Another member of the Egyptian theocracy, of 
whom we have but scanty accounts, was Papremis, 
whom Herodotus calls Ares, or Mars. He was wor- 
shipped in the province of the same name, under the 
form of the Hippopotamus, f At least that animal 
was the sacred beast and tutelar god of this district. 

Ssfya, (T£?w)VY lt rjs s'SujXov faariv slvcu rav Tloiva. This was evi- 
dently a statue of Osiris, or of Horus. See Plutarch, de Isid. 
p. 371 3 and the Count de Cay] us, Recueil d'Antiq. torn vi. 
where several figures of Osiris occur,exactly of this description. 

* There is no ground, in any of the accounts which the 
ancients have left us, for Jablonski's hypothesis, that the 
worship of Mendes bore a reference to the Sun ; and the Coptic 
interpretation of the name, on which that author founds his 
conjecture, is forced and unsatisfactory. 

f Herod, ii, cap. 71. Item, cap, 59 — 61, 

R 



122 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

Herodotus gives no hint that the worship of Pa- 
premis was connected with that of Typhon; but we 
learn from Plutarch, that the Hippopotamus was a 
Typhonian animal. '•* At Hermopolis," says Plu- 
tarch, " they show a statue of Typhon, which repre- 
sents a river-horse, on the back of which stands a 
hawk, fighting with a serpent/' He adds, cc that on 
the seventh of Tybi, when the Egyptians celebrated 
the arrival of Isis from Phoenicia, they made cakes 
stamped with the form of a river-horse bound/' 

Eusebius informs us that there was, in the city of 
Apollinopolis, a statue of Horus, or Apollo, in the 
act of transfixing Typhon. Apollo was represented 
with a human figure and the head of a hawk, and 
Typhon in the form of a Hippopotamus. He adds, 
that the Hippopotamus was supposed to denote the 
western pole or quarter of the heavens, and that he 
was represented as gaping upwards and receiving 
into his open jaws the descending Sun.* 

The Hippopotamus was, in ancient times, well known in 
Egypt, but had disappeared in the age of Julian. Nonnus 
describes it in terms which prove that its habits were little 
known in his time. 

i* There swims upon the flood the wandering horse, 
Whose huge black hoof shatters the silver wave." 

Dionys. lib. xxvi. 

From the time of Job, the Hippopotamus has been a type 
pf strength and impetuosity. Bochart asserts it to be the 
Behemoth. Hierozoic. part 2, lib. v. 

* Euseb. Prosp. Ev. lib. iii. cap. 12. 



ANUBIS. 123 

Prom these remarks, it would appear that Papre- 
mis was a form or avatar of Typhon, the genius of 
destruction. The Hippopotamus, the huge Behemoth, 
was no unapt image of the god of war. 



SECTION VII. 

Anoubis, or Anubis. 

Few of the Egyptian gods were more celebrated 
than Anubis. He was greatly venerated by the 
Egyptians in general, but chiefly in the city and 
nome of Cynopolis. The statue of Anubis had the 
head of a dog, and dogs were sacred in his dominion, 
and fed in the temples, at the public charge.* 

Anubis is mentioned by a great number of classical 
authors.f Propertius alludes to him, in speaking of 
Cleopatra. J 



C( Ausa lovi nostro latrantem opponere Anubim, 
Et Tiberim Nili cogere ferre minas," 

* Strabo. lib. xv. p. 558. Stephan de urb. voc. nvvwv TtoXi;. 

f A large collection of these authorities may be seen in 
Bochart's Hierozoicon, part 1, lib. ii. cap. 56, page 69 1, to 
which Jablonski has added some others. As there may be some 
of my readers who have not access to either of these authors, I 
shall give the citations. Herod, lib. ii. cap. 66. Diodor. 
lib. i. p. 52, 54. Clemens Alex, in protreptico, p. 25. Lucian. 
in Deorum concilio. Ovid, lib. ii. Amor. Eleg. 13. Athe- 
nseus, lib. vii. p. 300. Virgil. iEneid. vii. v. 698. et Serviusad 
locum. Plutarch de Iside et Osir. p, 368. item p. 380. iElian 
de Animal, lib. xi. cap. 26. 

% Propertius, lib. iii, eleg. 11. 



124 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

The attribute of Anubis is enveloped in great 
obscurity. Plutarch says that some of the Egyptian 
writers understood, by Anubis, the horizontal circle 
which divides the invisible from the visible part of 
the world.* Jablonski has adopted this idea, and has 
attempted to afford countenance to it by his etymo- 
logy of the name of the god, which he derives from the 
Coptic word "Nub, orAnnub/' signifying " Golden." 
But this epithet would more aptly be applied to 
twilight, the harbinger of day, than to the horizontal 
circle ; and there are some considerations which 
render it probable that this phenomenon, among 
others, was refered to Anubis, and may have given 
origin to the name. 

Anubis was the constant companion and precursor 
of Isis and Osiris, but chiefly of the former. Hence 
the Greeks call him Hermes or Mercury. He is so 
named by Martianus Capella, who mentions him in 
the following lines ; 

■Qui solus ante currum 
Et candidos jugales 
Altipotens parentis 
Memorem ciere virgam. 

Satyrico, lib. ii. 

Apuleius thus describes him, as appearing at the head 
of the procession in honour of the goddess. ce Nee 
mora, cum Dei dignati pedibus humanis incedere, 
prodeunt ; hie horrendum attollens canis cervices 
arduas, ille superum commeator et inferum, nunc 
aurea, nunc atra facie sublimis, laeva caduceum^ 

* Plut. ibid. 



ANUBIS. 125 

gerens, dextra palmam virentem quatiens."* Dio- 
dorus assigns him the same place, in front of the 
pomp of Isis.f Plutarch says that Mercury, by 
which name he here evidently means Anubis, is 
seated in the Moon, in her circuit round the world, £ 
and is represented as the faithful guardian of Isis. 

Anubis may have had originally a meaning simply 
physical; but his attributes were in later times at 
least more extended, and he was regarded as the 
harbinger of the gods, as the opener or beginner of 
all their operations. He resembles in some respects 
the Mercury, iu others the Janus of the Romans. 
Thus he is called, by Statius, " the door-keeper."§ 

u Te prseside noseat 
Cur servet Pharias lethseus Janitor aras." 

This relation, perhaps, suggested the idea that 
Anubis was the Egyptian Kronus. We learn from 
Plutarch, that this was the opinion of some writers in 
his time. || 

The physical explanation preferred by Jablonski 
is incompatible with the testimony of Plutarch, men- 
tioned above, viz. that Anubis was imagined to hold 
his station in the Moon, and revolve with that planet 
round the world. It is not less opposed to the state- 
ment of the old writers^ that Mercury was a daemon, 
who assisted the magician, and was every where 
ready when roused by incantations. Dion Cassius 
relates, that when the army of Marcus Aurelius was 
distressed for want of rain,, the Egyptians, by means 

* Apuleii Metamorph. lib. xi. f Diodor. lib. i. p. 78. 

% Isid. cap. 43. § Statii Sylvarum, lib. iii. num. 2. v. 108. 
[| Plut. Isid, p. 368. 



126 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

of magical arts, obtained the aid of that Mercury who 
dwells in the air, and of other daemons, and that 
through their intervention relief was given to the 
troops in salutary showers.* 

After all, it must be confessed that the proper and 
original character of Anubis lies under no small 
degree of obscurity. It appears indeed, that in 
heaven he held the office which the Greeks gave to 
Aurora, the forerunner of day ; that in the festivals 
of the gods he was the leader of the pompous pro- 
cessions, and that he was regarded every where as 
the companion or harbinger of Isis and Osiris. In 
many particulars hi corresponds with Janus ; in 
others with Mercury ; yet the resemblance to either 
is far from complete. That Anubis had in the 
Egyptian mythology the office of <c Pompaios/' or of 
conducting the souls of the dead to their place of 
destination, seems to be proved by some remains of 
ancient painting and sculpture. f 



SECTION VIII. 

Thoth, or Mercury. 

There was another Egyptian god, whom the 
Greek and Latin writers uniformly name Hermes,, or 

* In Epitome Xiphilin. 

f See the Plate adjoined, where Anoubis is represented as 
performing the office of the " Commeator Inferum." The 
former of these figures is copied from Montfaucon's Antiquities, 
and the latter from the Count de Caylus's Collection, See 
also the figure of Anubis in the Frontispiece. 



THOTH, OR MERCURY. 137 

Mercury. They say that in the Egyptian language 
he was called Theuth, or Thoth. 

To this Hermes all the science and learning of 
the Egyptians were attributed. He taught them the 
art of writing, gave them laws, and instructed them 
in astronomy, geometry, medicine, and other sci- 
ences.* Hence the books composed by the priests on 
these subjects, which were preserved in the Egyptian 
temples, were called Hermetic books, as being con- 
secrated to Hermes, and supposed to be written by 
persons inspired by this god.f 

From this character of Hermes, many writers have 
supposed that he was a learned man, who made many 
useful inventions, and was deified through gratitude. J 
But this notion is evidently of Grecian origin, and 
foreign to the habits and ideas of the Egyptians. 
Thoth appears to have been a god of the same class 
with the other objects of Egyptian worship, and to 
have had either a physical, or an ideal origin. 

Like other Egyptian deities, Thoth had a sacred 
animal appropriated to him, whose form was con- 
nected with his particular rites. The animal conse- 
crated to Thoth was the Ibis,§ that bird of which 
such prodigious numbers have been found embalmed 
in mummy-pits. It is reported by many authors, 

* Plat, in Philebo. p. 156. Cicero de Nat. Deor. lib. iii. 
cap. 22. 

f Iamblich. de Mysteriis iEgypt. 

X Authorities cited by Harles, in the first vol. of Fabricius's 
Biblioth. Graec. De Hermeticis libris, 

§ The consecrated animal of Thoth was the Ibis, according 
to Plato in Phaedro, p. 212. Horapoll. Hieroglyph, lib i, cap. 
10, et 36. iElian. de Animal, lib. x. cap. 29, 



128 OF THE OTHER EGYPTIAN GODS. 

that Mercury, when the gods were assailed by Typhon, 
changed himself into an Ibis, in order to elude the 
pursuit of that monster.* 

Pisce Venus latuit, Cyllenius Ibidis alis. 

Ovid. Met. lib. v. 330. 

The Ibis, then, was the favourite form of Mercury, 
or that representation under which he chose to be wor- 
shipped by his votaries in Egypt, particularly in the 
Hermopoiite nome. Let us now inquire further into 
the nature of this god. 

We have seen that his attribute was science, or that 
he was supposed to preside over and inspire all the 
sacred or mystical learning of the Egyptian hierarchy. 
We have found however, that the gods of this peo- 
ple had in general their origin in some physical idea, 
rather than in any metaphysical or abstract conception. 
Hence there is reason to suspect that the same obser- 
vation may be true respecting Thoth, or Hermes. 
The allusion which the form of the Ibis, as an emblem 
or hieroglyphic, is said to contain, will perhaps direct 
us to the original sense of this ideal being. 

Horapollo informs us that the Egyptians cc designate 
the heart by the emblematical figure of the Ibis ; for 
this animal/' he adds, ff is intimately connected with 
Hermes, the president of the heart, and of the reason- 
ing faculty ; the form of the Ibis itself bears a singular 
resemblance to the heart, and this congruity is a 

* Ci Quo timore permotos (deos) in alias figuras se conver- 
tjsse, Mercurium factum esse Ibidem, &c. ,> Hyginus. Poet. 
Astron. lib. ii. cap. 28. See also Antoninus Liberalis ; Fab. 
28, aud Apollodorus, lib, i. p. 21. 



THOTH, OR THE EGYPTIAN MERCURY. 129 

circumstance much noticed by the Egyptians/'* iElian 
also says that " the Egyptian fabulists observed that 
the Ibis,, when it was seen sitting with its neck bent 
forwards, and its head concealed under its wings, re- 
sembled the form of the heart/' 

The Ibis was therefore the emblem by which the 
Egyptians represented the heart ; and we are informed 
that they, in common with many other ancient nations, 
regarded the heart as the seat of the intellect. f We 
may consider this as the physical idea which gave 
origin to the Egyptian Hermes, who, as Horapollo 
says, was the president of the heart, or a personifica- 
tion of that wisdom that was supposed to dwell in the 
inward parts/' 

* Horapoll. Hierog. lib. i. cap. 10. 

f Some passages in the writings of Solomon show that this 
was the notion of the Hebrews, at the time when their con- 
nection with the Egyptians was most intimate. " He hath 
put understanding in the heart, and wisdom in the inward 
parts." — Ecclesiastes. 

Not only the passions, but the rational powers, were by most 
of the ancients referred to the heart ; and Galen thought it ne- 
cessary to enter into a formal argument, in order to show that 
the understanding or the reason, which he calls ee ro fjyspovtKov," 
the governing principle, had its chief seat in the brain. Galen 
de Dogm. Hippocrat. et Plat, 

The passions are still, in vulgar language, referred to the 
heart ; and the origin of this prejudice is very obvious. It is 
alluded to in the following quaint verses of Anaxandrides, the 
comic poet of Rhodes. 



ISO POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

The last-mentioned writer observes, " that besides 
the Ibis, one species of Scarabaeus was consecrated to 
Hermes."* 



" O malicious heart ! 
Thou alone rejoicest in the evils of the body, 
For thou leapest whenever it is seized with terror." 

See Athenseus. Deipnosophistse, lib. xv. p. 688, and Casaubon. 
Animadvers. p. 973. 

* Though the existence of Thoth among the Egyptian gods 
seems as well supported by ancient authority as that of most 
other members of the theocracy, yet Jablonski has whimsically 
chosen to erase him from the list, merely because the word 
Thu-othi, in the Coptic, signifies a pillar. Hence he con- 
jectures, with much ingenuity, that the name of the pillars or 
obelisks on which the sciences of the Egyptians were set forth 
in inscriptions^ gave rise to a mistake, and occasioned the in- 
vention of the god Thoth. Yet the worship of the Ibis was so 
celebrated, and has left us so many vestiges, and the testimony 
is so uniform, that Thoth was the god adored under this form, 
that the existence of Osiris himself, (such existence as can 
be predicated of beings engendered in the brains of pagan 
mythologists) is scarcely better authenticated than that of the 
first Hermes. 



CHAPTER IV. 

OF THE EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

SECTION I. 

Of Isis. 

The ancient writers mention several Egyptian 
goddesses. Most of these, however, if not all of 
them, appear to have been nothing else than varied 
forms or characters of Isis. Before we consider the 
descriptions of these goddesses, it will be necessary 
to recapitulate and generalize the observations made 
in a former chapter, on the attributes of Isis. 

Jablonski considers Isis as simply denoting the 
Moon. It is certain that the worship of this goddess 
had a close relation to the Moon; and there are some 
passages in which the ancient writers intimate, or 
expressly declare, that Isis was only another name 
for that planet. We have cited a passage from 
Diodorus, in which he informs us, cc that the Sun and 
Moon were adored by the Egyptians under the titles 
of Osiris and Isis." The same assertion is made by 
Diogenes Laertius.* We are also told by Plutarch, 
that some authors expressly affirmed " that Osiris 
was the Sun, and that Isis was nothing else than the 
Moon ; that some of the images of this goddess were 
accordingly made with horns, in imitation of the 

* Diogenes Laertius de Vit. Philos. in Prooem. 



132 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

lunar crescent,, and were attired in sable robes, to 
denote those occultations and shadowings which the 
Moon undergoes in the pursuit of the Sun ; that for 
this reason the Moon was invoked in all affairs of 
love, over which Eudoxus affirms that Isis presides/'* 
The well-known story of the Argive Io was doubtless 
founded on the Egyptian fables relating to Isis. Jab- 
lonski has remarked that Io was the common term for 
the Moon in the Coptic language; and he has cited 
some passages which declare that the ancient people 
of Argos invoked the Moon by this appellation. f 

But the name of Isis seems only to have been ap- 
plied to the Moon in the same manner in which Virgil 
gives the appellation of Ceres to that celestial body. 
The general acceptation of both these names is 
much more extensive. 

Herodotus repeatedly observes, cc that Isis corres- 
ponded with the Demeter of the Greeks/' % and 
Diodorus confirms this assertion. Demeter, or Ge- 
rneter, as the name sufficiently proves, meant origi- 
nally the Earth, and the epithet is thus explained by 
Lucretius : § 

Linquitur at merito maternum nomen adepta 
Terra sit, e terr& quoniam sint cuneta creata. 

« The Earth is rightly called the Mother, 

Since from the teeming Earth all things arise." 

* Plutarch de Isid. et Osir. cap. 52. 
f Jablonski Panth. iEgypt. 

% Icrtg 8s la-ri %OL r ta. fyp EAA^vwv y\w<r<rav AypyTyp. Herod, 
lib. ii. cap. 59. 

§ Lucret. de Rer. Nat. lib. v. 796. 



EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. ISIS. ]&3 

Macrobius, whom we have before cited,, agrees 
with these authors. He says, ec Nee in occulto est, 
neque aliud esse Osirim quam Solem, nee aliud Isin 
esse quam Terrain ;"* and again, cc Isis est vel 
Terra, vel Natura rerum subjacens Soli."f Plutarch 
generalizes all the attributes or characters of Isis, and 
considers her as representing " the female qualities 
or powers of Nature, which are the passive principles 
of generation in all productions; whence," he says, 
" she is called, by Plato, the Nurse/' and the " All- 
receiving, and is commonly termed Myrionymus, 
or ce Possessing ten thousand names." \ The same 
idea is more diffusely expressed by Apuleius, in a 
passage in which Isis calls herself, cc Natura, rerum 
parens, elementorum omnium domina" — ec quae cceli 
luminosa culmina, maris salubria flumina, Inferorum 
deplorata silentia, nutibus meis dispenso; cujus 
numen unicum, multiformi specie, ritu vario, nomine 
multijugo, totus veneratur orbis/'§ 

The sphere of the Moon, as we have already 
observed from the testimony of Macrobius and 
Ocellus, was regarded as the boundary of the celestial 
and the sublunary world. The Moon was the great 
moving body of the lower heavens, in which Isis 
was supposed to receive the fertilizing influences of 
Osiris, and to disseminate them through the nether 
regions. Hence it seems to have happened that the 
Moon was considered as the chief seat of the genial 
goddess of Nature. 

* Macrob. Saturn, lib. i. c. 21. f Macrob. lib. citat. c. 20. 
X Plut. de Isid. cap. 53. § Apuleius, lib. xi. 



134 POPULAR RELIGION OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

Other passages of a similar import have been adduced 
in a foregoing section, in which we have considered 
the Orphic theology and the division of Nature into 
masculine and feminine attributes. 

On the whole, we may conclude that Isis repre- 
sented the cc tf>u(rig 7ramio'Aog," the " Naiura Multi- 
formis" of the Greek and Roman mythologists. 

We now proceed to the remaining goddesses of 
Egypt, who owe their origin to a subdivision of the 
attributes of Isis. 



SECTION II. 

Of Boubastis, called, by the Greeks, Artemis, or Diana. 

In the city of Bubastis, or Bubastos, there was a 
celebrated temple dedicated to the goddess Bubastis.* 
ec This name, " says Herodotus, " is synonymous with 
the Greek Artemis, or Diana. Bubastis was the 
daughter of Osiris and Isis/'f We have very scanty 
accounts of this divinity: it would appear that her 
worship had been discontinued, or had sunk into ob- 
scurity, before Egypt fell under the Roman yoke. 
Otherwise Juvenal would scarcely have said,J 

" Oppida tota canem venerantur, nemo Dianam." 

We may, however, rest satisfied, that her rites and 
character corresponded nearly with those of the 

* Herod, lib. ii. cap. 136. Stephan. de Urbibus. 
f Herod, lib. citat. cap. 156. % Juvenal, Sat. xv. v. $. 






EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. BUBASTIS. 135 

Grecian Diana, from the constant testimony of Hero- 
dotus, who frequently alludes to the Egyptian goddess, 
under the Greek name. Like Diana, Boubastis was 
a chaste goddess; at least she is called by Ovid, 
cc Sancta Bubastis;" and, like Dian or Lucina, she 
presided over child-birth. Hence the following 
epigram of Nicarchus, cited by Jablonski from the 
Anthology.* 

obra) Bou£ao"T/£ xoLTOLhuerai' hi yao exafrrr) 
ts^stoli wg olutt}, rig Seov ectti "Koyog. 

te Thus shall Boubastis lose her dignity : 
If every dame should be delivered thus, 
The goddess may go starving." 

Bubastis was worshipped or represented under the 
form of a Cat, and all the cats that died in Egypt were 
salted and buried at Bubastos.f From the peculiar 
veneration in which these animals were held by the 
Egyptians, we may conjecture that this goddess was a 
great favourite. Ovid alludes to her assuming the 
shape of the cat. J 

" Fele soror Phcebi; nivea Saturnia vacca; 
Pisce Venus latuit." 

The cat, according to Plutarch, was honoured by 
the Egyptians, and its image was carved on the 
sistrum of Isis, with a peculiar reference to the Moon, 
with the changes of whose aspect that animal was 
supposed to have a certain mysterious sympathy. § 

* Jablonski Panth. f Herod, lib. ii. cap. 67. 
t Ovid.Metam. lib. 5, v. 330. § Plut, Isid. cap. 6d. 



136 POPULAR RELIGION OP THE EGYPTIANS. 

The sistrum is indeed generally found connected with 
the images of the cat in Egyptian sculpture. Lucina, 
or Diana, the goddess of child-birth among the 
Greeks and Romans, bore also some near relation to 
the Moon, and, as such, she is termed Diva Triformis. 

(( Montium custos nemorumque virgo, 
Quae laborantes utero puellas, 
Ter vocata audis adimisque letho 

Diva Triformis."* 

The triple form probably refers to the three phases 
of the Moon. 

The same goddess is invoked in the Carmen 
Saeculare, as follows : 

" Rite maturos aperire partus 
Lenis llithyia, tuere matres, 
Sive tu Lucina probas vocari, 

Seu Genitalis." 

She is termed Genitalis, as being favourable to the 
production of living creatures. 

But the lunar goddess was not equally propitious 
to child-birth in all her three phases or aspects. The 
superstitious notion, that certain ages of the Moon 
were most favourable to infants and to all new 
productions, and that other aspects were unlucky, 
prevailed very extensively; but we do not find an 
universal agreement in the particular ideas with 
which it was connected. Among the Jews, the full 
moon was believed to be lucky, and the two other 
aspects disastrous. " The full moon," says the Rabbi 

* Horat. Od. lib. iii. 22. 



BUBASTIS. PHASES OF THE MOON. 137 

Abravanel, "is propitious to new-born children; but 
if the child be born in the increase or in the wane, 
the horns of that planet cause death; or if it survive, 
it is generally guilty of some enormous crime."* 

The Jewish Rabbins probably derived many parts 
of their dsernonology from the Egyptians, but we 
cannot venture to ascribe this superstition to the 
latter people without some further proof. 

The Greeks and Romans entertained a similar idea 
respecting the lunar phases. The general opinion 
among them seems to have been, that the Moon 
presented a lucky aspect, or was propitious to child- 
birth, as long as its luminous face was on the increase, 
especially when near the full, and that the waning 
period was unfavourable. 

Plutarch affirms that the Moon was supposed, when 
full, to assist at child-birth and relieve the pains 
of women. Hence, he says, (C Diana is called 
Lochia, and Eilethyia, or Lucina, a name which refers 
to the Moon ; and that planet was expressly termed 
by the poet Timotheus, eoxuroxog^-f cc the helper and 
quickener of child-birth." In another work, Plu- 
tarch adds " that women go through their labour 
most easily at the full moon. "J Proclus observes 
sc that various productions prosper when the moon 
is getting full, and fail when it is waning. "§ Horace 
invokes 

Rite crescentem face Noetilucam 
Prosperam frugum.|| 

* Basnage's Hist, des Juifs. liv. iv. chap. 11. 
t Plutarch Sympos. lib. iii. p. 658. 
% Idem in Quaestionibus Romanis. 
§ Proclus in Hesiod. Op. et dies. 
II Horat. Carm. lib. iv. od.6. 



138 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

As this fable was common to several nations whose 
superstitions were derived in great part from Egypt, it 
is probable that the Egyptians had some notion of a 
similar kind; and this seems to be proved by our 
finding that the cat, which was thought to be sym- 
bolical of the Moon, represented the Egyptian Diana 
or Boubastis. What the particular notion of the 
Egyptians on this subject may have been, we have no 
opportunity of determining. Jablonski has made an 
attempt at deciding on this point, but I think he is 
unsuccessful. I shall add some observations on his 
theory respecting the superstitions connected with 
the phases of the Moon, in a subsequent page. 

On the whole we may conclude that Boubastis, or 
that goddess whose emblem was a cat, represented 
the beneficial influence which the Moon, or a female 
daemon residing in the moon, was imagined to exert 
over childbirth and pregnant women. It was pro- 
bably to the rites of this goddess that Chseremon 
chiefly alluded, in a passage quoted above, where he 
says that a part of the Egyptian mythology referred to 
the phases of the Moon. 

The office of Boubastis is only one of the various 
functions of Isis; and the names and attributes of 
these goddesses coalesce. Both are nearly related to 
the Moon ; and Isis, as well as Boubastis, was invoked 
by parturient women, as Eilethyia, or Lucina. 

Isi, Parsetonium, genialiaque arva Canopi 

Quae colis, et Memphin, palmiferamque Pharon, 

***** 

Per tua sistra precor, per Anubidis ora verenda : 
Lenis ades, precibusque meis fave ; Ilithyia. 






BUBASTIS. — HER RELATION TO ISIS. 139 

* O Isis, who delight'st to haunt the fields 
Where fruitful Nile his golden harvest yields, 
Who dwell'st in Memphis and the Pharian towers i 
Assist Corinna with thy friendly powers. 
Thee, by thy silver sistrum, I conjure, 
A life so precious by thy aid secure ; 
So may'st thou with Osiris still find grace. 
Oh ! by Anubis' venerable face 
I pray thee ; so may still thy rites divine, 
Flourish, and serpents round thy offering twine. 
May horned Apis at thy pomp attend, 
So thou the fair Corinna dost befriend."* 

Diodorus has asserted that the city of Boubastis 
was erected in honour of Isis. Here the two god- 
desses are evidently confounded, or we must suppose 
that they were regarded as two personifications of 
the same power or attribute of nature. The Grecian 
Ceres and Proserpine seem to have been related to 
each other in the same manner. 

Ovid. Amor. lib. ii. Eleg. 13, Dryden's Translation. 






140 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

SECTION III. 

Eilethyia. 

Diodorus mentions an Egyptian goddess to whom 
a city in the Thebaid was dedicated, and whose name 
he interprets, according to his custom, by the title of 
the corresponding goddess in the Grecian mythology.* 
The denomination he assigns to this goddess is Eile- 
thyia, the Grecian Lucina. The historian says " that 
she was reckoned among the ancient or elder divini- 
ties, of the same class with Jupiter, the Sun, Hermes, 
Apollo, and Pan." The distinction of ancient gods 
might be thought to exclude Isis,f if the name of 
Apollo were not expressly mentioned. Since, how- 
ever, we find Apollo, or Horus, included in this class, 
we are allowed to suppose that the Eilethyia of Upper 
Egypt may have been Isis, or Boubastis, under some 
particular form. We have seen that the office of 
Lucina was attributed to both these goddesses in the 
Egyptian mythology. 

Eusebius also mentions Eilethyia, and the city 
where she was worshipped. He adds, cc that every 

* Diodor. Sid. lib. i. 

f In the Grecian theogony, Diana was a younger goddess 
than Ceres, who corresponds with the Egyptian Isis. Yet the 
Greeks sometimes made Lucina one of their ancient or elder 
goddesses. Olen, the Delian mythological poet, who lived 
before Homer, represented Lucina as the same with Tieitpia^,Bvr lt 
or Fate, as made her more ancient than Saturn. See Pausa- 
nias. Arcadica. 21. 



VINDICTIVE ISIS. THE EGYPTIAN HECATE. 141 

third day/' meaning, probably, the third in each 
lunation, {C was consecrated to her, and that her 
images had the form of a female vulture, with its 
wings spread, and composed of precious stones." This 
bird was in a particular manner sacred to the Moon.* 



SECTION IV. 

Of Isis, in her maleficent or vindictive character. Tithrambo, 
Hecate, or Brimo. 

It is well known that, among the Greeks, Diana, or 
the daughter of Ceres, f or Ceres herself, for these 
personages are but faintly distinguished from each 
other and often coalesce, was supposed to have 
changed her form on her descent to Hades, and to 
have become a goddess of stern and vindictive cha- 
racter. Hecate, or Proserpine, (who was the same 
goddess, under a different name,) J was the punisher 
of guilt, and the mistress of the Furies. Hence she 
is described, by Nonnus, as supplying those direful 
avengers with arms. || 

* Euseb. Prsep. Evangel, lib. iii. cap. 12. 

f See Schol. ad Lycophron. Cassand. v. 1176, and parti- 
cularly Meursius's Commentary on the passage. 

X Diana was the daughter of Ceres, according to the most 
correct mythologists. See Herod, lib. ii. Horus and Bou- 
bastis were nursed by Bouto or Latona; hence arose the 
mistake of the Greeks, who fancied that Apollo and Diana 
were the son and daughter of Latona. 

|| Nonni Dionysiac. 



142 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

cc Tlsptre^ivrj Scopri^su 'Epivuvag." 

And Virgil speaks of her as leading them in her train. 

" Nocturnisque Hecate triviis ululata per urbes 
Et dirae Ultrices." 

Even Ceres herself assumed the form of an Erinnys or 
Fury; and this metamorphosis is described by Apol- 
lodorus and Pausanias. It is alluded to in the follow- 
ing verse of Antimachus : 

AyfjLriTpog roKe Qourh HLpivvmg ehai sMQ\ov* 
ec This they report to be the shrine of the Fury Ceres." 

Lycophron calls this goddess 

Ewa/« 
Eptfov' JLpMug Qovpla ^KpYj^opog.-f 

<c Erinnys raging, with the brandished sword, 
Queen of Sicilian Enna's flowery meads. "% 

Callimachus thus describes Ceres, assuming her 
vindictive form.§ 

£i7rsu o ircCig, ~Ns{xs(rig §s xolx?\v lypa-i^aro (pcovrjV 
H6[xara [zzv -/kpa-m, xeCpoCha. Ss ol a\|/ar OXu/jwra>* 

* Pausan. Arcad. cap. 25. 
t Lycophron. Cassand. v. 11 77« 

J Lord Royston's translation of Lycophron, published in 
the Classical Journal. 

§ Callimach, Hymn, ad Cererem. 



VINDICTIVE ISIS. THE EGYPTIAN HECATE. 143 

oi [lev ap rjfJuOvrjrsg lire) tolv 7t6tviolv eiftov 
e^a7riUYjg a7ropov(rof.v. 

<e He said, and on her fatal tablet Nemesis 
Inscribed the words. Damater, burnt with rage, 
Straightway assumed her godlike form, and trod 
The ground, while with her awful head she touched 
Heaven's canopy. The demi-gods beheld 
The fearful aspect, and in hasty flight 
Sought safety.'' 

It is further remarkable that this vengeful Hecate, 
the leader of the Furies, who so much resembles a 
phantom engendered b}^ the terrors of a guilty con- 
science^ is still strangely connected with the Moon. 
Like the chaste Dian, she has a triple form., corres- 
ponding with the three lunar aspects. Lycophron 
calls Hecate, 

x7<ayyoucn Tap£rjG-ou<ra hv()y_ioi$ QpoTGug* 

" The spouse 
Of gloomy Dis, queen of the triple form, 
Persean Brimo, who with fearful yells 
Disturbs our slumbers in the gloom of night." 

The triple form referred originally, as Phurnutus 
declares, to the three phases of the Moon : her 
statue had three heads. 

Ora vides Hecates in tres vergentia partes. f 

* Lycophron, v. 1177* 

f Ovid, Fast. lib. i. Meursius has collected a number of 
passages referring to the triple form of this goddess, in his 
Commentary on Lycophron's Cassaudra, v. 117G. 



144 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

In the Egyptian mythology also we learn that Isis 
assumed the vindictive character, though we have but 
scanty information on this subject. The goddess was 
supposed to inflict various diseases, such as madness, 
but particularly blindness, on those who incurred her 
wrath. This idea is expressed in an epigram of 
Lucilius, contained in the Anthology.* 

r}V riif £)(yis Sy£0£ov Aiov6(rie juwj xoLTOLpa<rr\ 

rr\v \<rw tovtio, [xyj^s tov AfA<pixpoLT7) 
ju,7$* sing Tu<pAot>£ 7roiei dsog. 

And in a passage of Ovid. 

Vidi ego linigerae numen violasse fatentem 

Isidis,, Isiacos ante sedere focos. 
Alter ob huic similem privatus lumine culpam, 

Claraabat media, se meruisse, via.f 

Whether the vindictive Isis was distinguished by 
peculiar rites is not certainly known; but, from the 
circumstance that the Greeks describe an Egyptian 
Hecate, it seems probable. That certain rites were 
performed in honour of a goddess whom the Greeks 
considered as the same with the Egyptian Hecate, 
appears from a passage in Epiphanius, which has not 
escaped the industrious research of Jablonski. 

AxXo/ Ss rij TiQpa[A,£ia 3 TLxoltji IpjU/qvsuoj&si/Tj, srspot 
Trj Ns$6i/f, aXhoi 8s rij QsppovQi tsXig-xovtou. 

<c Some are initiated in the rites of Tithrambo, which 
is interpreted Hecate; others in those of Nephthys, 

* Cited by Jablonski. 

f Ovid. Epist. de Ponto. lib. i. cap. 1. 



NEPHTHYS, THE EGYPTIAN VENUS. 145 

and some in those of Thermuthis. Diodorus Siculus 
also speaks of a temple of Hecate the Dark. 

Hecate had therefore distinct rites in Egypt, and 
We must refer to her all that has been said respecting 
the vindictive Isis. 

In the following* invocation of Apuleius to Isis, her 
various characters are assembled. " Regina cceli sive 
tu Ceres alma, frugum parens originalis — seu tu cceles- 
tis Venus, — seu Phoebi soror quae partu fcetarum me- 
delis lenientibus recreato, populos tantos educasti — 
sen nocturnis ululatibus horrenda Proserpina, triformi 
specie larvales impetus comprimens, terraeque claustra 
cohibens, vario cultu propitiaris." 

Thus it appears that Isis, or the triform goddess, 
that is, Isis residing in the moon, was worshipped with 
various rites, as a malignant or benignant power. In 
the former, we scarcely distinguished her from Bou- 
bastis, or Diana ; in the latter she may be regarded as 
corresponding with the Grecian Hecate. We now 
proceed to the celestial Venus, whom Apuleius also 
identifies with Isis, but who appears to bear no par- 
ticular relation to the Moon. 



SECTION V. 

NephthySy or Venus Urania. 

Nephthys, the sister of Isis and the wife of Typhon, 
was called by the Greeks, Aphrodite ; she differs, how- 
ever, in a great many particulars, from the Grecian 
Venus. 

u 



146 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

Plutarch gives us a physical explanation of Neph- 
thys. He says, cc the horizontal circle divides the 
lower and invisible parts of the world from the upper 
and visible. The former is by the Egyptians called 
Nephthys; the latter, Isis."* 

We learn from Hesychius, that the Egyptians wor- 
shipped a goddess whom the Greeks called (C A<ppo^lr^ 
S*or/a/' f* the dark or nocturnal Venus. "f This was 
evidently Nephthys 

Chaeremon, the Egyptian priest whom we have 
before quoted, enumerates among the physical objects 
which his people worshipped, " the nocturnal and 
diurnal hemisphere/ 'J He thus confirms the testimony 
of Plutarch. Nephthys is the divinity of the dark or 
infernal hemisphere. 

This interpretation is further confirmed by Hora- 
pollo, who says, cc that the upper hemisphere of the 
heavens was called, by the Egyptians, Minerva, and 
the lower one, Juno."§ We shall have occasion to 
show, that Minerva and Isis are frequently identified 
in the Egyptian mythology. It is here evident, that 
Horapollo gives the name of Juno to the same goddess, 
whom the writers we have before appealed to call 
Venus. This will presently be still more manifest. 

Herodotus assures us, that the Egyptians had no 
goddess corresponding with the Juno of the classical 
mythology. When the Greek writers mention Juno 

* Plut, de Isid. cap, 44. t Hesych. voce 2xor/a. 

% Chaeremon apud Porphyrium loc. supra cit. 

§ Aox.£7 itap Aiyviftlois 'Afyva juiy, to avw *ov 'Qvpccvov 'H/ucr- 
fyfyiov direix-ri^hou' to $g xarw 'Hpa. Horapollo de Hierogh 
lib. i. cap. IK 



NEPHTHYS, THE EGYPTIAN VENUS. 147 

among the divinities of that people, we are to under- 
stand the celestial Venus, whose attributes coincide in 
many particulars with those of Juno, and whose wor- 
ship was very celebrated among the Eastern nations, 
/Elian, in speaking of a town in the Hermopolitan 
nome, adds, — C( in that town they worship Venus, 
calling her Urania, or Celestial, and paying honours 
to a sacred cow."* This circumstance, that the 
celestial Venus was worshipped in the form of a cow, 
is important. 

We are told by Strabo also, that the sacred animal 
of Venus was a white cow; and that her worship was 
celebrated in more than one place in Egypt. He says, 
" the Momemphite people adore Venus, and have a 
sacred cow, which they keep in the same manner as 
the Apis is kept at Memphis, and the Mnevis at Helio- 
polis." This geographer, in describing the nome 
of Aphroditopolis, remarks, that it contains a city 
of the same name as the city of Venus, where a white 
cow is kept, which the people regard as sacred, f 

Now it is worthy of notice that the white cow is 
mentioned expressly as the animal form of Juno. 

' latuit nive& Saturnia vacca.J Ovid. 

The conclusion to be drawn is, that Juno and the 
celestial Venus are the same. 

From all these testimonies we are authorized in 
determining, as a matter fully established, that the 

* iEHan. de Animal, lib. x. cap. 2*J. 

f Strabo. lib. xVii. p, 552. Item. p. 556. 

J That Venus, who assumed the form of a fish, was probably 
a goddess more allied to the Grecian Venus, the offspring 
of the sea; or she might represent Nephthys, in another 
character, as the sea-goddess. 



148 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

goddess Nephthys, sometimes called Urania the 
celestial, or the dark or nightly Venus, at other 
times Juno or Saturnia, was worshipped in various 
parts of Egypt ; that a white cow was the sacred animal 
or living symbol of this goddess, and that she repre- 
sented the divinity of the dark or nightly heavens. 

In other respects, the information that we can collect 
concerning this goddess is very scanty. She had 
mysteries of her own, as we learn from Epiphanius,* 
into which certain persons chose to be initiated. It is 
difficult to say in what respects she resembled the 
Grecian Venus, except in the looseness of her cha- 
racter, f which was too common a failing among 
heathen goddesses, to furnish occasion for any parti- 
cular remark. 

We learn further, by comparing a passage of Orion 
the grammarian, preserved in the Etymologicum Mag- 
num, with one of Hesychius, that the Egyptian Venus 
had also the name of Athyr or Athyri. ee Athyri/' says 
the former, cc is the name of a month, and the Egyp- 
tians call Venus Athor, giving to the third month of 
their calendar the denomination of that goddess/'J 
Hesychius interprets Athyr to be the name of a month, 
and likewise the denomination of an ox or cow, in the 

Epiphan. loc. supra citato, 

f During the absenceof Isis, Nephthys contrived to inveigle 
Osiris, who mistook her for his wife, and begot a spurious on> 
spring, which was afterwards called Anubis. Isis discovered 
the cheat by means of a garland of Melilotus, which Osiris left 
with her sister. — Plut. de Isid. cap. 14. Plutarch gives an 
ingenious explanation of this fable, which, however, has no ; 
reference to our present purpose. 

\ Etym. Magn. voce 'AQvo. 



NEPHTHYS, THE EGYPTIAN VENUS. 149 

Egyptian language.* By this he probably meant that 
it was the appellation of the sacred cow of Aphrodito- 
polis. This city is besides called by Herodotus, 
Atarbechis, f which is only Atar-baki, J or the city of 
Atar or Athyr ; and the historian has informed us, that 
it contained a temple of Venus. 

From all these evidences we learn that Venus had 
the same appellation as the Egyptian month Athyr, or 
Athyri.§ 

This name, however, was not peculiar to Nephthys, 
but common to her and her sister Isis ; for Plutarch 
affirms that Isis was called Athyri.§ cc Athyri," says 
Plutarch, ec is interpreted the mundane habitation of 
Horus," that is, perhaps, the region in which Horus as 
the Sun is enclosed, and in which he may be said to 
dwell; for this seems to be rather a periphrastic epi- 
thet than a close translation of the name. The Sun 

* Hesych. f Herod, lib. ii. cap. 41. 

% See Jablonski, Pantheon. iEgypt. lib. i. cap. 1. 

§ It is plain that the name of this goddess was Athyr, or 
Athyri, and not Athdr, as Jablonski would have it, in order that 
it may sound more like Ejor, which, in the modern Coptic, 
means Night. The resemblance, however, is very faint. 

Jablonski has very diligently collected authorities in favour 
of his own idea respecting the Egyptian Venus, but has passed 
over those which are adverse to it, particularly Plutarch's 
account, which directly contradicts him. By Athor, he sup- 
poses that the Egyptians personified primeval night, or Chaos; 
but this explanation is purely conjectural, aud the testimonies 
above adduced seem to me fully sufficient to establish a very 
different idea. There is not one fact that renders it probable 
that the Egyptians, in the worship of Athyri, had any allusion 
to Chaos, or the origin of the world. 

§ Plut. de Isid. cap. 56, 



150 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

dwells alternately in each hemisphere ; each of them 
therefore becomes Athyri, or the habitation of Horns, 
in its turn. 

We here find an analogy between the superstition 
of Egypt and that of the Syrian fabulists appealed to by 
Macrobius, who divided the two hemispheres between 
Venus and Proserpine, and represented the Sun as 
passing alternately from one to the other, and Venus 
as lamenting when her Adonis had descended to the 
realm of Proserpine. Proserpine here corresponds 
with the Venus Tenebricosa of the Egyptians, and it 
is very probable that the name which Macrobius 
interprets Venus, had a sense resembling that of 
Athyri, and connected alternately with each hemis- 
phere, or with the enlightened and dark face of the 
sky. 

It is not improbable that Athyri referred to some 
relations of Isis and Nephthys, in which these two 
goddesses were supposed to coalesce, or merely to 
characterise two forms of the same imaginary per- 
sonage. In this latter way they are represented in 
the invocation of Apuleius, who addresses his god- 
dess as " the Queen of Heaven, whether she prefers 
to be called Ceres or Isis, the original parent of the 
fruits of the earth ; or the celestial Venus who first 
infused love into the two sexes of animated nature/' 

Indeed we may learn that some very close relation 
subsisted between Venus and Isis, from the fact that 
th6 former was worshipped under the form of a cow ; 
for we know that the cow was the favourite avatar of 
Isis.* 

* iElian. loc. citat. 



BOUTO, OR LATONA. 151 

It is possible that the metamorphosis of the super- 
nal Isis into Venus the Dark, whose only form was 
that of a cow, is alluded to in the mythologue of Isis 
and Osiris, where it is said that Horus, having torn 
off from the head of Isis her diadem, (her celestial 
glories) it was replaced by a helm representing the 
head of a cow or ox. 



SECTION VI. 

JSouto, or Latona. 

The Egyptians worshipped another goddess, whom 
the Greeks call Latona. At Boutos, near the Seben- 
nytic mouth of the Nile, there was a very celebrated 
oracle, dedicated to this goddess, the earliest account 
of which we have from Hecataeus, who travelled in 
Egypt before Herodotus, and from whom the latter his- 
torian has been accused, probably without reason, of 
having borrowed a great part of his description of 
Egypt. "In Boutos," says Herodotus, "stands a temple 
of Apollo and Diana (Horus and Boubastis) ; that of 
Latona, whence the oracles are delivered, is very 
magnificent, having porticos forty cubits high. The 
most wonderful thing is the shrine of the goddess, 
which is of one solid stone, having equal sides, each 
forty cubits in length, &c." He adds, cc that near 
the temple is the island of Chemmis, which the 
Egyptians affirm to float in a deep and spacious lake. 
He did not see it move, and was astonished at the rela- 
tion." In this island is a large temple of Apollo, with 



152 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

three altars. It brings forth many palm-trees and 
other plants, some of which are barren, others produ- 
cing fruit. The Egyptians give the following account 
of the floating condition of the island : it was once 
fixed and immovable ; when Latona, who has always 
been reckoned among the eight primary gods, dwelt 
at Boutos. Having received Apollo in trust from 
Isis, she consecrated and preserved him in this island,, 
which, as they declare, now floats. This happened 
when Typhon, eagerly endeavouring to discover the 
son of Osiris, came hither. Their tradition says, that 
Apollo and Dian were the offspring of Bacchus 
(Osiris) and Isis, and that Latona was their nurse 
and preserver.* 

Stephanus Byzantinus seems to be the only author 
who has preserved the Egyptian name of this goddess ; 
for all the other Greek writers term her Leto, or 
Latona. He says, she was called by the Egyptians, 
Buto. 

The Greek mythologists agree in asserting the 
physical meaning of Latona to be cc Night, or Dark- 
ness." Jablonski has cited a passage of Porphyry, 
and one from Phurnutus, to this effect; and Eusebius 
has preserved a fragment of Plutarch, in which the 

* Herodotus adds, that iEschylus hence derived his story, 
according to which, Diana was the daughter of Ceres ; whereas 
others made her the daughter of Latona. This account was 
more consistent with the theogony than the vulgar one. For 
Dian in the heaven, became Hecate, or Proserpine, in the 
infernal regions. They were then the same, and both the off- 
spring of Ceres or Isis. Pausanius confirms the observation 
of Herodotus. See Larcher's Note on Herodotus, in this 
place. 



BOUTO OR LATONA. 153 

same conclusion is drawn. Apollo and Dian are 
more than once called the offspring or nurselings of 
Night; and it would appear that Sophocles had this 
idea in view, in the following invocation to the Sun. 

"ATmov, ohm atrd). 

Trachin. v. 93. 

The sacred animal of Bouto, or Latona, was the 
Mygale, or Shrew-mouse ; for this was the form which 
she assumed to escape the pursuit of Typhon.* This 
animal, according to Plutarch, was held sacred by the 
Egyptians, and was accounted, from its supposed 
blindness, an emblem of primeval night, or dark- 
ness. f The receptacles for the dead were termed, 
as Hesychius informs us, gouroi ; (e bouti." It is possible 
that this term may have some reference to the god- 
dess who presided over night and the darkness of the 
tomb. 

On the whole, it must be confessed that we are very 
imperfectly acquainted with the Egyptian Latona; 
but, from all the obscure hints that can be assem- 
bled from ancient authors on this subject, it appears 
very probable that she was the guardian of night, or 
of the dark or infernal regions ; and if this conclusion 

* Antoninus Liberalis. See also Herodotus, ii. cap. 67. 

f It is singular that, after citing the foregoing authorities, 
Jablonski evades the inference which follows, and almost 
without a shadow of proof, or even ground for conjecture, 
asserts Bouto, or Latona, to be the Full Moon. 

x 



154 EGYPTIAN GODDESSES. 

be correct, her attributes and character nearly 
coincide with those of Athyri, or Venus Tenebricosa. 
At least, it must be allowed that we are not suffi- 
ciently acquainted with the nature of the Egyptian 
mythology, to point out the true distinction between 
these goddesses. 



COMMENTARY on Chap. IV. Sect. VI. 

Remarks on JablonskVs Opinion respecting Boubastis or 
Diana, and Bouto or Latona. 



Jablonski, as we have before observed, refers several of the 
Egyptian gods to the different stations of the Sun, and sup- 
poses that this luminary was worshipped in different seasons 
of the year, under the names of Harpocrates, Amnion, Horus, 
and Hercules. This author has framed a similar hypothesis 
respecting several Egyptian goddesses, which he refers in like 
manner to the different phases of the Moon. According to 
him, Isis represents the Moon in general, as Osiris is the 
Sun in all the seasons ; but the New Moon is Boubastis, the 
daughter of Isis, as Harpocrates, the offspring of Osiris, was 
the New or Solstitial Sun. The Full Moon is Bouto, or 
Latona. To complete this scheme, he should have found 
some anologies to prove that Tithrambo, or the maleficent 
Hecate, was the Waning Moon. 

It is not without some degree of regret that I remark, that 
this system, so simple and ingenious, is wholly without support 
in ancient authorities. Indeed, with respect to the Egyptian 
goddesses, which is the point we are now concerned with, 
Jablonski has all authorities completely against him. Boubastis 
should be the New Moon, and Bouto the Moon at the full, or 
the Plenilunium. Now we need only refer to the foregoing 
section on the Egyptian Diana, in order to be clearly convinced 
that this conjecture is erroneous. Several authors are there 
quoted, who refer Boubastis to the Full Moon, or mention 
that phasis of the planet as the aspect peculiarly favourable to 
child-birth. What is singular is, that Jablonski has himself 



156 COMMENTARY ON CHAPTER IV. 

adduced most of these passages as if in support of his notion 
that Diana was simply the New Moon. But all his industry 
has not enabled him to find one testimony which tends to 
prove any reference to the Full Moon in Bouto or Latona. 

The fact seems to have been, that neither Lucina the god- 
dess of child-birth, nor Hecate the maleficent;, referred singly 
to any one aspect of the planet. We have shown already that 
they were both called Triple-formed. They were both sup- 
posed to exist during all the ages of the Moon. It is impossible 
in the present day to explain, and probably there was never 
any good reason why the Moon should be the seat, or the visible 
form, of so many goddesses, whose functions have little or no 
relation to each other. We must beware, in our researches 
into the fictions of mythology, lest we discover more wisdom 
or more contrivance than ever really existed. 

The idea that the Moon exerts an influence favourable to 
propagation is so strange and absurd, that we are at a loss to 
imagine how it can have arisen, in any one instance ; and it is 
truly astonishing to find that similar fictions were extended 
through a great part of the pagan world. Even the barbarous 
Greenlanders, sprung from the remote Esquimaux of the 
Labrador coast, believe, as Egede informs us, that the Moon 
now and then comes down to pay their wives a visit. The 
latter, in order to prevent the lunar deity from taking any im- 
proper familiarities, are careful to spit upon their fingers and 
rub their bodies before they go to sleep. For a similar reason, 
the young maids are afraid to stare long at the Moon, imagin- 
ing that they incur a danger of becoming pregnant. At an 
eclipse of the Moon, no woman ventures to go abroad. — Egede's 
Description of Greenland. 



SUPPLEMENT TO BOOK I. 

OF THE EGYPTIAN GODS, COLLECTIVELY. 

We now proceed to make some observations on the 
Egyptian gods, collectively. 

Herodotus mentions three series of gods, which, 
as he was informed, ruled over Egypt as successive 
dynasties. The first rank, or the oldest dynasty, 
contained eight gods ; these are termed the most 
ancient of the Egyptian deities. He mentions the 
names of only two of them : they are Pan and Latona. 

From these eight gods were produced another 
dynasty, consisting of twelve. Among these, he 
says, the Egyptians reckoned Hercules. 

Of the third rank, who were produced from the 
twelve, was Bacchus or Osiris. 

Thus we find that there were no less than twenty 
gods, who, according to the statement of Herodotus, 
were more ancient than Osiris and Isis. 

We have already enumerated most of the Egyptian 
deities of whom any thing remarkable has been re- 
corded by the ancients. Most of those we have 
mentioned are various forms, as we have seen, of 
Osiris, Typhon, Isis or Horns, and all these belong- 
to the third rank, or were subsequent to the ogdoad 
and the dodecade. We find, therefore, no less than 
twenty places in the Egyptian pantheon, of which we 
can scarcely fill up two or three. 



158 EGYPTIAN THEOCRACY. 

It is easy to perceive that there must be some error 
in this enumeration. When we consider how many 
Greek authors have treated professedly on the Egyp- 
tian mythology , and take into the account the frequent 
notices that are scattered incidentally in the works of 
other writers,, we cannot be induced to believe that 
the two highest ranks in the theocracy have perished, 
without leaving even their names behind. Two 
observations will afford sufficient ground for inferring 
that this has not been the case. 

1. We learn from Herodotus, Strabo, Diodorus, 
Stephanus, and some others, to what divinities all the 
most celebrated and magnificent temples in Egypt 
were dedicated. They are all distributed among the 
gods whom we have traced in the works of these 
authors,* and none remain for the unknown tribe 
whom Herodotus has placed in reserve. 

2. It is agreed among all writers, that all the Egyp- 
tian gods were adored in the forms of sacred animals, 
and not of statues in the human shape : each of them, 
we are told, had his respective avatar in the brute 
kingdom. Now we have enumerated the principal 
sacred animals, and have seen that they are appropri- 
ated to the gods, with whom we are acquainted. 
The twenty older gods of Herodotus have no re- 
presentatives. 

It fortunately happens that Manethon and Diodorus 
Siculus furnish us with some hints that tend to 
elucidate this subject. 

* There are, indeed, three gods in the Egyptian theocracy, 
who have not yet been mentioned : these are, Phthas, Cnuphis, 
and Neitha, or Vulcan, Agathodsemon, and Minerva. They 
will be described in the following Book. 



EGYPTIAN THEOCRACY. 159 

Manethon began his Egyptian chronology, as pre- 
served by Syncellus, by two dynasties of gods prefixed 
to the first race of mortal kings who reigned in the 
Thebaid. These two dynasties occupy the same 
place as the first and second races of gods mentioned 
by Herodotus. Manethon calls the elder dynasty gods, 
and the second demigods. Their names are as 
follows : 

THE GODS WERE, 

1. Vulcan 5. Osiris 

2. The Sun 6. Isis 

3. Agathodaemon 7. Typhon. 

4. Saturn 

THE DEMIGODS. 

8. Horus 13. Ammon 

9. Mars 14. Tithoes 

10. Anubis 15. Sosus 

11. Hercules 16. Zeus. 

12. Apollo 

If we follow Manethon, and make up the first 
dynasty, or the ogdoad, of the names of Osiris, Isis, 
and their correlatives, we shall have no difficulty in 
filling up the second rank, or the dodecade, with the 
subordinate gods, including various forms of the 
primitive or elder series. 

Diodorus Siculus has given us a more ample dis- 
cussion on the Egyptian theogony, and his account 
seems to place this subject in Js true light. Osiris 
and Isis, Minerva and Ceres, and Vulcan and 
Oceanus, together with Ammon, constitute, according 
to Diodorus, the most ancient order of the Egyptian 
gods. These, says our author, were immortal and 



160 EGYPTIAN THEOCRACY. 

celestial beings. We have seen that they were ideal 
personages,, representing the most striking attributes 
of nature. In another place Diodorus says the an- 
cient gods of the Egyptians, meaning this same class, 
included Jupiter, the Sun, Mercury, Apollo, Pan, 
Eilithyia, and many others. 

But besides these, the Egyptians professed, as 
Diodorus informs us, to have other earthly gods, who 
were originally mortal men, but, by reason of their 
wisdom, or the benefits conferred by them on mankind, 
had obtained deification. These were the first king:s 
of Egypt ; and, according to this historian, many of 
them bore the same names as the celestial gods. He 
enumerates among them, Sol, Saturn, Rhea, Ammon, 
Juno, Vulcan, Vesta, and Mercury. 

We learn, from this relation, that the gods who are 
said to have reigned in Egypt, and who are placed by 
Herodotus and Manethon, as well as by Diodorus, at the 
head of the dynasties, were not the proper divinities of 
the Egyptian temples, but were allowed expressly to 
have been men who bore the same names with the ce- 
lestialgods. It seems that the Egyptians had a vague 
tradition, like many other nations,, that their most an- 
cient kings were the offspring of the gods. They formed 
at a later period the chronicles of their monarchy on 
an artificial system, founded on assumed astronomi- 
cal epochas, and having determined to fill up a certain 
space of time with the succession of their dynasties, 
they found it convenient to assign the earlier ages 
to the imaginary reign of these hero-gods. They 
arranged them in dynasties ; but as the enumeration 
was altogether arbitrary, it was formed in various 
ways, and there are not two writers who give it in the 
same order. 



EGYPTIAN GODS COLLECTIVELY. 161 

Of all these writers however, Manethon, as being an 
Egyptian priest, must be supposed to have possessed 
the most accurate information ; and, as he wrote 
expressly on this subject, we may give him credit 
for having been more diligent than either of his 
rivals, in his compilation of the Egyptian chrono- 
logy. If, therefore, there was any one method of 
stating this succession of gods that was more au- 
thentic than others, we may conclude it to be that 
which Manetho has adopted. 

We shal^ therefore, on the authority of Manethon, 
reckon Vulcan and Agathodeemon, called in the 
Egyptian language Phthas, and Cnuphis, as the 
most ancient of the gods ; and next to them we must 
place Osiris, Isis, and their corelatives. To these we 
must add, on the testimony of Herodotus and Diodo- 
rus, Pan, Eilithyia, and Latona. These fill up the 
ogdoad. The dodecade, or the second order, may be 
completed by enumerating the gods of an inferior 
description, such as Amnion, Hercules, Mars, Anubis, 
Hermes, or Thoth, and the particular forms assumed 
by the greater gods, as Chemmo, the god of Panopo- 
lis, a form of Osiris, iEsculapius, a form of Serapis, 
and the goddesses who were forms of Isis and Neph- 
thys. We shall thus fill up the catalogue with names, 
which had in reality temples consecrated to them in 
Egypt, and had representatives among the sacred 
animals. 



BOOK THE SECOND. 



PHILOSOPHICAL DOCTRINE, COSMOGONY, &c. 
OF THE EGYPTIANS. 



CHAPTER I. 

INQUIRY INTO THE ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY OF THE 
EGYPTIANS, RESPECTING THE SUPREME DEITY, AND 
THE ORIGIN OF THE WORLD. 



In the foregoing outline of the more popular fables 
and more striking superstitions of the Egyptians, we 
have found little or no reference to the origin of the 
visible universe. The gods we are as yet acquainted 
with, are little more than deifications of the elements,, 
or personifications of the powers of nature most 
striking to the senses, or most obvious to reflection. 
It still remains for us to inquire whether the Egyptian 
philosophy regarded the system of the world as 
eternal, and its departments and energies as the only 
divine beings, or recognised, under any emblems, or 
in any more recondite doctrines, the existence of an 
invisible creator. 

In this instance we shall find it as useful to begin 
as before by adducing some fragments of Grecian 
antiquity: for it will be seen that all the representations 
which the Orphic and Pythagorean philosophy con- 
tains with reference to the origin of the world, were 
derived from the successors of Hermes ; and they have 
been handed down to us in a more perfect form from 
the Greeks than from the Egyptians. 

One of the oldest specimens of the Orphic philosophy 
now extant is contained in a passage of Hesiod's 



166 ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY OP THE EGYPTIANS. 

theogony, which describes the origin of all things from 
Chaos. The following is a literal translation of it : 

" Chaos existed before all ; next the wide-bosomed 
Earth j the ever-secure abode of the immortal host 
who dwell upon the tops of snow-clad Olympus, and 
within the dark Tartarus, in the recesses of the 
spacious ground ; and Eros, or Love, who is the most 
beauteous of the immortal gods. 

" From Chaos sprang Erebus and sable Night ; 
from Night came iEther and Day, whom she brought 
forth in the embraces of Erebus." 

With Chaos the Orphic poems connect the fiction 
of an egg, from which they represent the whole 
organized world to have been developed. 

There is a well-known passage in the Birds of 
Aristophanes,* which contains this conceit. In this 
comedy the author has turned into ridicule all the 
most prominent features of the established supersti- 
tion of his country. We may therefore conjecture 
that the fables that refer to the cosmogony are not 
presented to our view in the most favourable shape. 
The following is a literal translation of it. 

" Chaos existed first, and Night and black Erebus, 
and spacious Tartarus. And there was neither Earth, 
nor Air, nor Heaven. Then Night, clothed in sable 
plumage, in the boundless bosom of Erebus, first 
brought forth an Egg, spontaneously conceived, from 
which, in the revolution of ages, sprang the beautiful 
Eros, or Love, resplendent with golden pinions, swift 
as the whirlwinds. He fecundated the dark-winged 

* Aristophanes: Birds, 694. 



ORPHIC COSMOGONY. 167 

Chaos in the vast Tartar us, and gave origin to our 
kind (viz. to birds,) and first brought us forth to light. 
The race of immortal beings had no existence, until 
Eros confounded all the elements. But when dis- 
cordant elements were mixed, the Heaven, and the 
Ocean, and the Earth, arose, and the imperishable 
race of blessed gods." 

In these passages the physical doctrine of the 
Grecian mystics assumes the character of materialism : 
matter is represented as the original cause, and mind 
as subsequently produced. But the fragments of 
the Orphic philosophy appear to contradict each 
other, with reference to this subject. The fabulous 
being, Eros, who was engendered in Chaos, is called, 
in a passage of the Argonautics, the cc oldest of 
beings/'* who reduced into order the parts of the 
universe ; and in an epitome of the Orphic doctrine, 
contained in the Clementine Recognitions he is 
described as a masculo-feminine divinity, generated 
by the turbid elements, which he afterwards sepa" 
rated and arranged. But another representation, 
directly the reverse of this, is given in the most explicit 
manner, in more than one place : the whole work of 
production is attributed to a primitive intelligent 
being, who is described as giving existence to the 
masculo-feminine demiurgus. This divinity, who 
was anterior to the creation, is called Saturn, the 
oldest of the gods. I shall cite a passage from the 
Argonautics of Orpheus, in which the cosmogony 

* Argonaut, v. 423. 

irp£<r£vTx,r6v re xa< ccvrorsXrj iroXu^Yjriv "Epcvra,' 
%<j-<ra. t fyuosv ditayra, hkrtfivs ¥ cfAAov qltc aXKov. 



168 ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

displays this form ; and this I apprehend to have been 
its genuine character. The poet proposes to himself 
to sing.* 

ap%atov [x,ev 7rp(ora Xaot>£ a^iyaprov avayxrp 

xa) ~Kp6vov 3 hg sT^o^siktsu a7rsips(rioi<rw &$' oXKo7g 
alSspa, xou $i<pv7] 7repia)7rsoi, xu§pov i 'JLpa)TOL 
Noxrog aziyvrjTr}g irarkpa kXutov, bu pa ^avf\ra 
QTrXoTspof xcLheouGri SpoTO*_, 7rpd)Tog yap s$a.vdri' 
HpifAOitg t subuvaroio yovag, 736 spy aibrjAa 
Triysvecov, oi Auypov air ovpavov £(rrd^avro 
(T7rip[xa youijg to 7rpoo~Ssy 3 odev yiuog i^syivovr* 
6uy]T(Su 3 01 Tcara yalav anrslpiTov a\eu sarri. 

" First, the vast fatal reign of ancient Chaos, 
and Kronus, who in the immense regions brought 
forth sether, and produced the masculo-feminine 
Eros, splendid and glorious, the great sire of 
primeval Night, whom later mortals term Phanes, 
because he first shone forth. Then I sing the 
birth of powerful Brimo (or Hecate,) and the 
evil deeds of the Earth-born progeny, (the giants) 
from whose wounds distilled the showers that 
gave origin to mortals inhabiting the spacious 
Earth."f 

* Argonaut, v. 12. 

f I have thus translated the last lines, with reference to the 
verses of Ovid, relating to the same fable. 

Obruta mole sua cum corpora dira jacerent, 
Perfusam multo natorum sanguine terram 
Immaduisse ferunt, calidumque animasse cruorem; 
Et ne nulla ferae stirpis monumenta manerent 
In faciem vertisse hominum. 



ORPHIC COSMOGONY. 169 

In another Orphic fragment, preserved by Proclus, 
in his commentary on the Timaeus, Kronus is repre- 
sented as existing' coevally with ancient Night, and 
discoursing with her on the creation he meditated. 

Maia, SsaSv u7ra.Tr), Nu§ oifxGpoTZ, Tojg rafts, <$pa%s 3 
irwg Zei [A aha.vo.Taav apyjyj xpaTspotypova SifrSai. 



ee O'erwhelmed in ruin their vast bodies lay -, 
The Earth, imbued with the warm vital blood 
Of her own sons, lest the fierce progeny 
Should utterly be lost, changing the forms, 
Gave origin to men." 

It is surprising that this strange fiction is preserved in more 
than one system of mythology, The idea of deducing the 
origin of animals and men from eggs, or seeds, is an obvious 
conceit, and so well suited to the infant state of philosophy, 
that we can account for its origin and extension ; but this 
fable, that the human race sprang from the blood of giants, is 
so wild and uncouth a notion, that it seems wholly unac- 
countable. Yet we recognise the same fable in the mythology 
of very remote nations. 

In the old Runic fragments, compiled in the Edda, the first 
being produced, is said to have been a huge giant, called Ymer, 
or Aurgelmer. The gods, or the sons of Bor, slew Ymer, and 
from his blood and body sprang mankind, and the world which 
they inhabit. 

In the Vedas we find a fable of exactly the same description. 
Viraj, the first created being, is a microcosm of the world. 
He is immolated by the gods on sacred grass ; and all the de- 
partments of the universe are represented as springing from 
his various members. The Purusha medha, or allegorical 
immolation of a human victim, was instituted in remembrance 
of this scene. See Colebrooke on the Religious Ceremonies of 
the Hindoos: Asiat. Res. vol. vii. p. 252. 

z 



170 ESORETIC PHILOSOPHY OP THE EGYPTIANS. 

" Immortal Night, supreme nurse of the gods! 
say how I may wisely ordain the origin of the 
deathless gods." 

Night replies, 

aids pi 7ravrcL 7rept{; atyarcn Tsxt&e, toTS* hi p,s<r<r*p 
cvpavav, h $£ re youav aTrsipiroUy kv $s 0ocAa<r<rav. 

M Surround all things with boundless aether, 
and place in the midst, heaven, and the vast earth 
and the sea."* 

Thus far concerning* the Orphic Chaos, and the 
great mundane Egg, which was hatched by the equi- 
vocal Eros, the generated demiurgus; who, as we 
perceive, was sometimes feigned to spring from the 
elements spontaneously, and at others is represented 
as the offspring of an intelligent power. We shall 
now endeavour to trace this cosmogony in the un- 
doubted remains of Egyptian antiquity. 

Eusebiusf informs us, on the authority of Porphyry, 
fC that the Egyptians acknowledged one intellectual 
Author or Creator of the World, under the name of 
Cneph ; and that they worshipped him in a statue of 
human form and dark blue complexion, holding in his 
hand a girdle and a sceptre, wearing upon his head a 
royal plume, and thrusting forth an egg out of his 
mouth/* " By the egg thrust out of the mouth of 
this god was meant the World, and from tills Cneph 

* See Procl. in Tim. ii. p. 63. 49. Eschenbach. Epigenes 
Orphicus. v. $9. Gesner. Orphic, p. 377. 
t Euseb. Preep. Evangel, lib. iii. cap. II. 



EGYPTIAN COSMOGONY. 171 

was said to be generated, or produced, another god, 
whom the Egyptians call Phtha, and the Greeks, 
Vulcan." Here we have the chaotic eg^ of the Orphic 
verses, created or produced by Cneph. This Cneph 
is mentioned by several other authors. Plutarch* 
informs us, " that he was worshipped by the inhabi- 
tants of the Thebaid, who refused to contribute any 
part towards the maintenance of the sacred animals, 
because they acknowledged no mortal god, and 
adored none but him whom they called Cneph, an un- 
created and immortal being." According to Strabo,f 
the temple of Cnuphis, (doubtless the same as Cneph) 
was in the island of Elephantine, at the confines of 
Egypt and Ethiopia. EusebiusJ also declares, that 
Cneph was the Phoenician Agathodaemon, or the Good 
Genius, and under this name we recognise him in 
the writings of Manethon and other authors. 

A more metaphysical account of Cneph is given by 
Iamblichus, from certain books ascribed to Hermes, 
which were extant in his time, and are regarded by 
that writer, who was deeply versed in the Egyptian 
philosophy, as genuine. He says, cc According to 
another order, Hermes places the god Cneph§ as the 
ruler of the celestial gods, whom he declares to be 
a self-intelligent mind, absorbed in his own con- 
templations. Before this Cneph he places one being 
without parts, which he terms the first occult power, 
and denominates Eikton ; " in this the first intelli- 
gible principle is contained ; it is worshipped only in 

* Plutarch de Isid. et Osir. f Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 562. 
% Euseb. Praep. Ev. lib. i. cap. 10, p. 41. 
§ The name is written Emeph in Iamblichus, probably by 
an error in the copies. 



172 COSMOGONY,, ETC.— CNEPH, PHTHAS. 

silence." — c< After these are other powers which preside 
over the formation of the visible world. The creative 
mind which proceeds to the developement of the 
universe, is called Ammon, Phtha, and Osiris, as it 
assumes different characters/'* 

We shall not attempt to ascertain whether Eikton 
and Cneph are modifications of the same name, as 
Jablonski asserts; but shall only remark, thatthis 
learned author is certainly wrong in confounding 
Cneph with Phtha, or the Demiurgus. These two 
beings are clearly distinguished in all the fragments 
we have of the Egyptian theology. Cneph, Cnuphis, 
or Ichnuphi, as Jablonski contends that his name 
should be written, is an eternal, unchangeable being, 
subsisting by himself, until a certain period, when he 
is represented as bringing forth the eg^, the symbol 
of the chaotic state of the world, and at the same 
time giving existence to a secondary being, whom 
the Egyptians termed Phthas, and the Greeks, 
Vulcan. 

Phthas is evidently the masculo-feminine being 
of the Orphic philosophy, produced in the chaotic 
eg^, and acting upon its elements. For we have 
seen that he corresponds in generation and office with 
the Orphic demiurge • and we are told expressly by 
Horapollo, that the Egyptians represented Phthas, 
like the Orphic Jupiter, as " apasvo^'kvg/' or mas- 
culo-feminine. f It was in his masculine character 
that this equivocal being was termed Vulcan; and, 
in bestowing this name upon him, we are told that 

* Iamblich. de Mysteriis, sect. viii. cap. 3. 
t Horapollo de Hieroglyph, lib. cap. 12- 



MASCULO-FEMININE DEMIURGUS — PHTHAS, NEITH. 173 

the Greeks made no reference to any other attribute 
of Vulcan than his character of artificer or demi- 
urgus.* 

But had the Egyptians any appropriate name or 
representation of this double being in its female 
form? Jablonski seems to have proved beyond 
all reasonable doubt that they had, and that the 
goddess Neith, whom the Greeks call Minerva, and 
who was worshipped at Sais, was the counterpart of 
Phthas, or the same being in his feminine character.f 
This is, indeed, distinctly implied in the following 
passage of Horapollo : — 

Aoxe7 yap auroig b xofr^og c-vverrTuvoLi ex rs toij ap(rsvix§ 
xou ftrfhuxou' Ett* §s rijg A$r}v6ig rov xavSapov, Iwi 8e 
H^omVtou tou yvira ypa<pov<rw. Outoi yap fxovoi Oswu Trap 
auro7g ap(TEVoQr}Xeig u7rap%ou(riv: 

" For the world seems to the Egyptians to con- 
sist of a masculine and feminine nature, and they 
designate Minerva by the form of a bull, and Vulcan 
by that of a vulture ; for these are the only gods which 
are represented by the Egyptians as having a double 
nature, or as being both masculine and feminine. " 

* Iamblich. de Mysteriis, sect. viii. cap. iii. In the reputed 
works of Hermes Trismegistus, we find a cosmogony, which 
seems to be nothing more than the Mosaic Genesis, blended 
with the wild ideas and physical theory of the Heathen poets. 
" There was a boundless darkness in the abyss, and water 
and a subtle intelligent spirit, abiding by divine power in 
Chaos ; then a holy light sprang forth, and the elements were 
compacted of sand from the humid substance, and all the gods 
distributed the seminal principles of nature/' Serm. Sac. 
c. iii. Herm. Trismeg. Opera. See Jackson's Chronological 
Antiquities,, vol. i. p. 17- 

t Jablonsk. Panth. iEgypt. lib. i. cap. 3. 



174 SUM OF THE EGYPTIAN DOCTRINE. 

Moreover, the very same attributes are ascribed to 
the Egyptian Minerva which belong to Phthas, as 
the author above cited has shown from a passage in 
Proclus on the Tinigeus,* and from several other 
authorities in which she is termed the formative and 
all-pervading power. To the same purpose is the 
celebrated inscription in the temple of Minerva at 
Sais : c: I am all that has been, and is, and shall be, 
and my veil no mortal hath ever penetrated. "f 

The sum of the Egyptian doctrine on the origin of 
things seems to be as follows. There existed from 
all eternity a self-dependent being, whom they term 
Cneph or Cnuphis, this name importing a good genius 
or spirit. From him was produced a finite creation, 
typified under the form of an egg, which represented 
the chaotic or unformed state of the world. There 
also proceeded at the same time from Cneph, a mas- 
culo-feminine principle, which animated the chaotic 
mass, and reduced its elements into organised forms. 
This being, in the masculine character, is Phthas or 
Vulcan ; in the female, Neith or Minerva. 

We thus find that the Egyptians, though they 
worshipped the elements of nature, were not alto- 
gether without some idea of a first cause, by whose 
agency the present universe was called into exist- 
ence; that they regarded the primitive deity as an 
eternal, intellectual, and spiritual being. 

* Referunt ^Egyptii, in Adyto Minerva Saiticae, legi hanc 
inscriptionem foribus insculptam. Quae sunt, quae erunt, 
quaeque fuerunt, sum ego. Tunicam meam nemo revelavit. 
Fruetus quern peperi fuit Sol." Procl. in Tim. lib. i. p. 30. 
The Sun was also the offspring of Vulcan, according to 
Manet hon. 

t Plut. Isid. et Osir. Also Proclus in Tim. lib. i. p. 30. 



RESPECTING THE ORIGIN OF THE WORLD. 175 

At the same time it must be allowed, that even in 
their account of the origin of the universe, and the 
operation of the creator, the Egyptians were not free 
from the weakness and imperfection which lies at the 
foundation of paganism : we find even here a mixture 
of sensual images, borrowed from the material world. 
The masculo-feminine being produced by Cnuphis, 
to whom the subsequent developement of the world 
in the way of generation is attributed, is a striking- 
instance of this description. 

Cnuphis, the first or primitive deity of the Egyptian 
mythology, is sometimes represented as the soul of 
the world or the universe, which, as we have obser- 
ved, was regarded as a living whole, and is by Plato 
called " an animal and a god/* tc To? irpaSrav &slv 
rep HolutI tw aurou vopt^ouG-tv/' says Plutarch, citing 
the words of Hecataeus, ' ' They consider the primitive 
deity and the universe as one identical being." We 
shall have an opportunity hereafter of illustrating 
this notion. 

From this soul of the world all subordinate souls 
originally emanated. Such, as Eusebius assures us, 
was the ancient doctrine of the Hermaic books ; and 
this testimony is abundantly confirmed, as we shall 
find, by other writers. 



CHAPTER II. 

OF THE ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS AND RENOVATIONS 
OF THE WORLD. 

Although the Egyptian priests,, and the Greek philo- 
sophers who derived their doctrines from Egyptian 
schools, spoke so decidedly respecting the origin of the 
world from the agency of an intelligent, spiritual, and 
eternal Being, there were other parts of their philo- 
sophy which seem to render it difficult to determine, 
whether they believed that the system of nature 
ever had a beginning, properly so called. The world 
is represented in some of their philosophical reveries, 
as subject to occasional destructions and renovations, 
which succeed each other at distant intervals in a 
perpetual vicissitude. At the end of each great 
period the whole assemblage of celestial phaenomena, 
which are regarded as the influential causes of all 
changes in the sublunary world, being restored to 
the same initial order, and proceeding in the same 
catenation as before, the whole series of events that 
depend upon them follow in their former connexion 
of place and time. The same individual men are 
doomed to be born again, and perform the same 
actions as before ; the same arts are to be invented, 
and the same cities built and destroyed. 

Alter erit tunc Tiphys et altera quae vehat Argo 
Dilectos heroas ; erunt etiam altera bella,, 
Atque iterum adTrojam magnus mittetur Achilles.* 

* Virg. Eclog. 4. 
A A 



178 ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS 

Whether this series of repeated creations and catas- 
trophes ever had a beginning, or was regarded as 
having existed for ever — whether there was any first 
link to the chain, we shall inquire, after stating the 
most important circumstances in this fable. 

This dogma appears to have been common to 
several of the early sects of philosophers in Greece.* 
We find traces of it in the remains of Orpheus ; and 
we shall show that there is sufficient reason to con- 
clude that the Greeks derived it from the Egyptians. 
It was a favourite doctrine of the Stoics, and held so 
prominent a place in their discourses on the nature of 
the world, and on fate, that it came to be regarded as 
one of the peculiar tenets of that school. It is chiefly 
unfolded in their writings, and we are indebted to 
them for most of our information concerning this 
curious part of ancient philosophy. 

The catastrophes destined at certain times to 
destroy the world are, according to the Stoics, of two 
kinds : one is the lesser, or partial destruction ; the 
other a more perfect dissolution. The cataclysm or 
destruction by deluge sweeps away the whole human 
race, and annihilates all the animal and vegetable 
productions of nature; the ecpyrosis, or conflagration 
of the world, dissolves the globe itself, and involves 
the very elements and the frame of the universe. 

1. Seneca has given us a magnificent account of 
the destruction by deluge. (C Inundationibus, quidquid 

* See particularly Lipsius de Physiologia Stoicorum^ Dissert. 
2 ; from which most of what has been said by late writers on, 
this subject seems to have been borrowed. 



AND RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 179 

habitatur (vetustas) obducet; necabitque omne ani- 
mal, orbe submerso." * " Decay shall involve the 
whole inhabited world, and shall destroy every ani- 
mated being"; the globe itself being submerged in 
the deep." He says in another place, " Ergo quan- 
doque erit terminus rebus humanis, cum partes terras 
interire debuerint, abolerive funditus totae, ut de 
integro totas rudes innoxiaeque generentur, nee 
supersit in deteriora magister." u . Tunc exsilient 
sub montibus flumina ipsosque impetu quatient." 
iC Omnes novum mare fabulas obruet." " Peribunt 
tot nomina; Caspium, et Rubrum mare." cc Peribit 
omne discrimen." cc Confimdetur quidquid in suas 
partes natura digessit." 

cc A term will some time be set to the career of human 
affairs, when all the productions of the earth are fated 
to perish and to become wholly extinct, in order that 
all may be brought forth anew, simple, and innocent; 
and without any of the old race surviving to show the 
example of evil. At that era streams shall break forth 
under the mountains, and shall shake them from their 
foundations. New oceans shall obliterate all local 
traditions. The Red and the Caspian Sea, and other 
celebrated names, shall be heard of no more. All 
distinctions shall be lost, and all the elements which 
Nature has distributed into their several provinces 
shall be confounded/' 

But the frame of the world will not be destroyed 
by the cataclysm. " Non semper ea licentia undis 
erit: sed peracto exitio generis humani extinctisque 
pariter feris, in quarum hominum ingenia transierant, 

* Consolat. ad Marciam. capite ultimo. 



180 ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS 

iterum aquas terra sorbebit; natura pelagus stare, 
aut inter terminos suos furere coget: et rejectus e 
nostris sedibus, in sua secreta pelletur Oceanus: 
antiquus ordo revocabitur: omne ex integro animal 
generabitur." * 

2. But a far more complete destruction awaits the 
universe., when the hour of the destined conflagration 
arrives. At this period the gods themselves are 
doomed to perish. Ci Mundo minantur interitum/' 
says the philosopher above quoted, cc et hoc universum 
quod omnia divina humanaque complectitur, si fas 
putas credere, dies aliquis dissipabit, et in confusi- 
onem veterem tenebrasque demerget/'f Ovid has 
thus described the catastrophe. 

Esse quoque in Fatis reminiscitur aifore teinpus 
Quo mare, quo tellus, correptaque regia coeii 
Ardeat et mundi moles operosa laboret.J 

n He knows a time will come, in Fate's decree, 
When ocean, earth, and heaven's high palaces 
Are doom'd to blaze ; and the whole universe 
Labour in vain with all-subduing fires," 

And Seneca, the tragedian : 

Coeli regia concidet 
Certos atque obitus trahet, 
Atque omnes pariter deos 
Perdet Mors aliqua et Chaos, || 



* Quaest. Naturalium. lib. iii. cap. 29. 

f De Consolat. ad Polrb. cap. 20. 

X Metamorph. lib. i. vers. 256. 

f| Seneca Tragced. Here. Oct. v. 1112, 



AND RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 181 

" The palace of heaven shall fall, 
And meet its destined destruction -, 
And all the gods alike 
Shall be the prey of Death and Chaos." 

By this catastrophe all created beings are to be de- 
stroyed, or resolved into the uncreated essence of the 
divinity. Plutarch makes the Stoic Cleanthes declare 
that the cc Moon, the Stars, and the Sun, will perish, 
and that the celestial aether, which, according to the 
Stoics, was the substance of the deity, will convert 
all things into its own nature, or assimilate them to 
itself* And Seneca compares the self-confidence of 
the philosopher to the insulated happiness of Jupiter, 
who, after the world has melted away, and the gods 
are resolved into one essence, when the operations 
of nature cease, withdraws himself for a while into 
his own thoughts, and reposes in the contemplation 
of his own perfections. f 

The same thing was affirmed by Chrysippus, Zeno, 
and Cleanthes; and we find passages similar to the 
foregoing cited by Cicero, J Numenius, || Philo 
Judaeus,§ and many other authors. 

We have only to make two or three further obser- 
vations on the circumstances connected with these 
fables, as we find them in the writings of the Greek 
philosophers and poets. 

* Plut. de Comm. Notion. 

f " Qualis est Iovis cum resoluto mundo, et diis in unum 
confusis, paullisper, cessante naturra, acquiescit sibi, cogitati- 
onibus suis traditus." — Seneca, Epistol. 9. 

X Cicero de Nat. Deorum. lib. ii. 

|| Numen. apud Euseb. Praep. Evangel, lib. xv. p. 820. 

§ Phil. Jud. de Immortalitate Mundi. 



182 ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS 

1. The returns of these catastrophes were con- 
nected with certain astronomical periods. Aristocles, 
quoted by Eusebius, says, iC xara rivag h^ap^hsg xa) 
wpio-fxsvouc; xpovovg sx7rvpQucrSai rov (T\)[}jKavra xo(T[aov."* 
cc That the whole world is consumed by fire after 
certain fated and defined intervals." And Numenius, 
in a passage cited by the same author, writes to the 
same effect. cs Ou yap hri rrjg rod xo(F[jloi> } x:aTa 
rag wspio^oug rag ^eyicrrag ysvo[j*ivr}g (pdopag, xuptcog 
7rspi7^a[x€ai/otJcriv ttJv tyQopav, hi rr\V slg 7rup avahixriv 
rdSv oAov ZoyiJ-ari^oVTeg, r\v Srj xa7\ou(7iv sxTruptoa-iv/'f 
cc Those who teach the dogma, that all things are to be 
resolved into fire, in what they call the Ecpyrosis, do 
not properly apply the term destruction to the catas- 
trophe which is doomed to happen to the world at 
certain great intervals of time." 

Censorinus connects the catastrophe with the pe- 
riods of the annus magnus, or great year, a cycle 
composed of the revolutions of the sun, moon, and 
planets; and which terminates when these bodies 
return together to the same sign, whence they were 
supposed at some remote epoch to have set out.J 
Julius Firmicus estimates the length of this period 
at 300,000 years ; after which, he says, the apoca- 
tastatis, or renovation of things, was supposed to 
happen. Orpheus is said to have assigned it a some- 
what shorter duration ; but Cassander lengthened it 

* Aristocles apud Euseb. 

f Numenius apud Euseb. 

X Censorinus de Die Natali. 

|| Censorinus mentions the opinion of Orpheus and Cas- 
sander. " Orpheij ad centum millia viginti " (aestimantis) 
<c Cassandri ad tricies sexies centena millia." Ibid. 



AND RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 183 

to 360,000 years. | All writers, however, connected 
the catastrophe with the revolution of the annus 
magnus, or great cycle. 

2. The Stoics were firmly persuaded that human 
nature was doomed to become in every succeeding 1 
age more corrupt ; and that the conclusion of this 
career of guilt and misery was a catrastophe that 
swept off from the face of the earth its polluted in- 
habitants, and prepared a place for a new generation 
of men, virtuous and innocent, whose posterity after 
many ages were predestined to undergo the same 
unhappy debasement, and to entail upon themselves 
a similar destruction.* " After the world has been 
cleared of its inhabitants, the ocean/' says Seneca,, 
<c shall be driven back to its own retreats, the ancient 
order of things shall be recalled, every tribe of animals 
shall be generated anew, and the earth shall behold 
men devoid of guilt, and born under better auspices. 
But the innocence of this race shall only continue 
while they are new from the hands of Nature. Vice 
and folly will soon creep in ; for virtue is with difficulty 
attained, and requires a guide and a controuling 
hand ; but vices are learnt without the aid of 
instruction. " Passages of a similar import are to 
be found in Cicero and Plutarch. f 

* " In sua secreta pelletur Oceanus : antiquus ordo revoca- 
bitur. Omne ex integro animal generabitur, dabiturque 
terris homo inscius scelerum, et melioribus auspiciis natus* 
Sed illis quoque innocentia non durabit, nisi dum novi sunt. 
Cito nequitia subrepet : virtus difficilis inventu est, rectorem 
ducemque desiderat : etiam sine magistro vitia discuntur." — 
Q. Nat. 3. c. 29. 

f Plut. de Comm. Notion. 



184 ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS 

Here we trace the fundamental idea of the fiction 
of the golden,, silver, and iron ages, so celebrated 
among the poets of antiquity. 

3. The succession of these catastrophes, and the 
relation of the cataclysm to the conflagration, seems 
not to have been accurately defined. We find contra- 
dictory opinions respecting it. According to some, the 
inundation succeeds immediately to the conflagra- 
tion :,* others reverse the order. Aristotle suggested 
an idea which appears to have led to the notion that 
they alternated with each other. Adverting to the 
fable of the reiterated flood, he says, e< It is probable 
that at a certain period of the great year a sort of 
winter takes place, when water abounds, as in the 
annual revolution of the seasons. "f This passage, as 
Lipsius has observed, seems to have been amplified 
by Censorinus, who quotes it as Aristotle's opinion, 
iC that the inundation constitutes the winter of the 
great year, or astronomical cycle, while the confla- 
gration or destruction by fire is the summer, or 
period of greatest heat." Accordingly he supposes 
them to alternate; and this notion has been adopted 
by several other writers. J But perhaps there was ori- 
ginally no connection between these singular fables. 

* Jul. Firmic. loc. citat. t Meteor, lib. i. cap. ult. 

X " Est praeterea annus," says Censorinus, " quern Aris- 
toteles maximum potius quam magnum appellat, quern Solis 
et Lunse vagarumque Stellarum orbes conflciunt cum ad idem 
signunr ubi quondam simul fuerant una revertuntur. Cujus 
anni hiems summa est Cataclysmus, quam nostri diluvionem 
vocant; aestas autem Ecpyrosis quod est mundi incendium. 
Nam his alternis temporibus mundus turn exignescere, turn 
exaquescere videtur. — Ceosorin. deDie Nat. Lipsius ubi supra. 



AND RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 185 

They appear to have been derived from distinct 
traditions. 

4. We might almost rest satisfied that these fables 
were derived directly or indirectly from Egypt, even 
if we had no positive assurance that such dogmas 
were maintained by the priests of that country. 
Several considerations would render that conclusion 
extremely probable. 

In the first place, we are well assured that the 
doctrine of successive destructions and renovations 
of the world was no new invention of the Stoics, but 
was common to them and all the older sects of philo- 
sophers among the Greeks, who are known to have 
derived their tenets from the Egyptian schools.* 
We are expressly assured by Plutarch, f that it 
formed a part of the physical doctrines of Orpheus, 
or pervaded those fragments of antiquity which were 
handed down as the verses of that poet, though pro- 
bably composed by various mystics or hierophants in 
the early and fabulous ages of Greece. We even 
find the period of time mentioned, which Orpheus 
is said to have assigned for the duration of each of 
his successive worlds. J 

The same dogma prevailed in the Ionic school; 
for Anaximander, the Milesian, taught that the source 
or principle of all things was infinitude ; whence 
infinite worlds arose, and into which they were 
resolved. || 

* Clemens Alexand. Strom, lib. v. 

f Plut. cle Defectu Oraculorum, cap. 12. 

J Censorin. ubi supra. 

j| Plutarch, de Placitis Philos. lib. i. cap. 3. 

B B 



186 ALTERNATE DESTRUCTIONS 

In the Italian school of Pythagoras^ we find the 
fable of conflagrations, which at stated intervals re- 
solve all beings into the primeval fire. Plutarch, 
who is quoted by Eusebius,* and Clemens, affirm that 
Heraclitus and Hippasus of Metapontum held the 
doctrine of the ecpyrosis or dissolution of the world 
by fire, and founded on this tenet a system of physical 
theology. And, according to Cicero, it was from 
the former of these philosophers that Zeno adopted 
this doctrine as a foundation for the system of the 
Stoics. f 

Now we are assured that the leading tenets of 
all these three systems of philosophy, viz. the Orphic, 
Pythagorean, and Ionic, were derived from Egypt ; 
and although we are at liberty to suppose that they 
received some innovations from those who introduced 
them into Greece, still we must conclude that such 
dogmas as were common to all the three emanated 
from the common source, which was the schools of 
Memphis and Heliopolis. J 

But we are not left in doubt upon this subject ; for 
Plato assures us that the Egyptian priests held that 

* Euseb. Prsep. Ev. lib. xiv. cap. 14. Clemens Alex. 
Cohortatio ad Centes, cap. 5. 

f Cicero de Nat. Deor. lib. iii. cap. 14. 

% There is a passage in the Asclepian Dialogue, ascribed to 
Hermes, containing this doctrine. "Tunc ille dominus et 
pater deus, primipotens et unus gubernator mundi, intuens 
in mores factaque hominum, voluntate sua (quae est Dei 
benignitas) vitiis resistens, et corruptelse errorem revocans, 
malignitatem omnem vel alluvione diluens, vel igne consumens, 
ad antiquam faciem mundum revocabit." — Dialog. Asclep. 
apud Hermetis Trismegisti Op. p. 607. 



AND RENOVATIONS OF THE WORLD. 187 

the world is subject to occasional deluges and con- 
flagrations, by which the gods arrest the career of 
human wickedness, and purify the earth from guilt.* 
Hence the Egyptians pretended that the story of 
Phaethon was founded on fact. It is true that the 
Egyptian priest, who is introduced by Plato as dis- 
coursing with Solon on this subject, is made to except 
his own country from these calamities. But this 
pretence, if it were really offered, may be imputed to 
the desire of extolling the antiquity of his nation. 

We learn from Syncellus and other writers, that 
the Egyptian astronomers made frequent use of long 
periods or cycles; and that the hypothesis of the 
great year, or portion of time in which the planets 
were supposed to return together to the same sign, 
originated with them. This is a part of the same 
scheme, and, together with the belief in the influence 
of the celestial movements upon sublunary affairs, 
lays the foundation on which the system of secular 
repetitions has been raised, and from which indeed 
it necessarily results. 

On the whole, it seems that we may regard the 
doctrine of successive periods of time terminated by 
a catastrophe by water or fire, a partial or universal 
destruction, as a dogma of Egyptian origin : at least, 
that we may conclude it to have been derived by the 
Greeks from Egypt. 

J Plato in Timaeo, prope initium. 



SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER II. 

ILLUSTRATION OF THE FOREGOING FABLE. 

We are not able to illustrate in a satisfactory manner 
the history of the doctrine which forms the argument 
of the foregoing chapter, by the aid of the Greek 
philosophers, who derived this tenet immediately 
from Egypt. Fortunately, however, for the history of 
mythology, the same dogma may be traced in the 
antiquities of several nations, who, if they obtained 
it not from Egypt, certainly derived it from some 
common source; hence, by comparing the various 
forms in which we find it, we are led to some conclu- 
sions respecting its origin, and the ideas with which 
it was connected in the cosmology of the Egyptians. 
Of the two catastrophes which are fated to return 
in alternation and destroy the world, or at least its 
inhabitants, the cataclysm, or destruction by water, is 
by far the most celebrated fiction. The ancient tra- 
ditions of many nations record circumstantially the 
history of one or more of these destructions. They 
are well known to form a prominent feature in the 
wild fictions of the Hindoos. The first Purana con- 
tains an account of a destruction by deluge, from 
which a few persons escaped in a vessel, being mira- 
culously preserved by Vishnu, who appeared incarnate 
in the shape of a fish.* This occasion presented the 
first of the ten avatars of Vishnu. The second and 

* This story forms the subject of the first Pura&a. Sir W« 



190 ALTERNATE CATASTROPHES, 

third, the Courma and Varaha, or the Tortoise and 
Boar incarnations, contain very similar narratives, 
and appear to be nothing else than varied accounts 
of the same event. 

In the old mythological remains of the Chaldeans, 
compiled by Berosus, Abydenus, and Polyhistor, we 
find a narrative of the destruction of the world by 
water, on which occasion a single family were pre- 
served in an ark, having been forewarned of the 
calamity by the gods. The same fragments contain 
an account of various services rendered to mankind 
by the fish-god Qannes.* It is manifest that this 
story is the Hindoo fable of the Fish Avatar, unt|er a 
somewhat varied guise. 

It is not my design at present to enter at length 
into an account of the avatars of the Hindoo gods. 
The stories, however, just referred to, are important 
to us, as they unfold the origin of the fable we have 
under consideration. No person who reads the 
legends of the Fish Avatar, and the appearance of 
Oannes and the flood of Xisuthrus, will doubt for a 
moment that they are both to be referred to the same 
origin as the Mosaic history of the deluge. The 
Chaldean story is nearest to this narrative, though 
adorned with the garb of mythology : it has gained 
much, as might be expected, in travelling further 
eastward. 

We cannot account for the origin of this fable, 

Jones has translated the whole narrative from the Bhagavat. — 
See Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 230. 

* See Syncelli Chronographia, p. 30. Suidas voce Nannacos* 
Euseb, Praep. Evang. lib. ix. c, 12. 



ILLUSTRATED FROM OTHER SOURCES. 191 

without supposing that it was founded on an histo- 
rical record of such a catastrophe.* There was, 
indeed scarcely any ancient people, who were without 
some tradition of this nature. 

The course of mundane affairs being imagined to 
depend on the influence of the celestial phenomena, 
and these again supposed to go through a certain 
round, subject to exact repetitions at the end of 
cycles of greater or less extent, the deluge, which 
once really happened, was reiterated in ancient stories, 
and expected to return. 

But these more partial destructions were not the 
only or the greatest catastrophes the world was 
expected to undergo. Brahma, the creator of the 
world, sprang from the essence of the eternal Brahme, 
the incomprehensible spirit. Brahma is not immortal, 
though very long-lived. The term of his existence is 
measured by five great Calpas, or five centuries of 
Brahma's years ; each of which years comprehends 
a prodigious lapse of ages. Every Calpa, except 
the first, is preceded by a general flood ; after which 
the renovation takes place. During the deluge 
Brahma reposes in slumber on the folds of the great- 
serpent Ananda. 

* This, indeed, cannot be imagined with respect to the 
conflagration. But the final and total destruction of the world 
was not regarded as an event which had yet happened, but as 
still future. It comes to us under the character of a prophecy 
of what is to take place in ages yet unborn. Such, as we shall 
see presently, is the Maha Pralaya, or great consummation. 
The floods, or lesser Pralayas, of which several have already 
happened, have very ditferent pretensions to an historical 
origin, since they are ranked among past events. 



192 ALTERNATE CATASTROPHES, 

The Calpa is the great anomalistic period of the 
Hindoo astronomers ; at the termination of which all 
the heavenly bodies are supposed to return to a line 
of conjunction, and to occupy the same position 
whence they are believed to have set out. 

Each of the four first Calpas is closed by the flood 
or lesser catastrophe. But a more awful doom yet 
awaits the world, when not only the human and all the 
animated inhabitants, but the solid globe itself is to be 
consumed or devoured. At the Maha Pralaya, which 
happens at the end of the last Calpa, the whole crea- 
tion, nay, the host of gods themselves, are involved in 
one common destruction.* This is evidently the fiery 
destruction, or Ecpyrosis, of the Greek philosophers, 
which the ethereal intelligence is alone destined to 
survive. 

The great antiquity of this fiction is placed in a still 
stronger point of view, if we take into consideration 
the fact, that it forms the foundation of the old Runic 
mythology and the sagas of the Scandinavians, and 
is even recognised in the plainest and most undoubted 
manner in the fables of the Aztecs, or ancient 
Mexicans. 

We shall now return to the Egyptian mythology, 
and apply the observations which result from this 
remote digression. 

* Maha Kala holding in his hands the roll of fate, and a 
scimitar to execute his office, devours first men and cities, the 
globe itself, and the whole universe. Brahma, Vishnu, and 
Siva then fall into his jaws; and Kala will finally destroy 
himself, and nothing will remain but Brahme, the self-exist- 
ing eternal spirit, into whose incomprehensible essence all 
beings are to be resolved. 



ILLUSTRATED FROM OTHER SOURCES. 193 

Without assuming* that there is any further affinity 
between the Indian and Egyptian fables, we may 
consider it as certain, that this fiction of repeated 
destructions and renovations, which we have found 
so widely spread, has the same origin in both systems. 
We shall find hereafter that the cosmogony of the 
Indians differed in few essential points from the 
Egyptian. But, without referring to any thing be- 
yond the present subject, it is sufficient to compare 
the stories which the Stoics disseminated in Greece 
respecting the catastrophes of the world, and the 
circumstances that accompany them, in order to 
arrive with certainty at the foregoing inference. 
The period of each world's duration was fixed in 
both schemes by the revolution of sidereal cycles. 
This destruction was preceded in both by pheno- 
mena of decay in the elements and in the moral 
world. Guilt and misery increased towards the ter- 
mination of each aera ; till at length the gods no 
longer bore with the wickedness of men, and a shock 
of the elements, or a deluge, overwhelmed them; after 
which calamity, Astrea again descended on the earth, 
and renewed the golden age. With all these circum- 
stances tending to connect them, we cannot think it 
unfair to infer, that the Egyptian tradition, the basis 
of the Stoical and Orphic fiction, was the same in its 
origin with the Indian fable of the pralayas. 

Hence we may conclude that the series of repeated 
destructions and renovations was not eternal, but that 
that the Egyptians, as well as the eastern cosmologists, 
regarded the universe as having had a beginning, 
and as destined, at some future period, to reach its 
termination. 

c e 



CHAPTER III. 

OPINIONS OF THE EGYPTIANS RESPECTING THE FATE 

OF THE DEAD MOTIVES FOR EMBALMING BODIES 

ULTIMATE ALLOTMENT OF THE SOUL EMANA- 
TION FROM, AND REFUSION INTO THE DEITY. 

It has often been observed, that the practice of 
embalming the dead, and preserving them with so 
much care and in so costly a manner, seems to indicate 
some peculiarity in the opinions of the Egyptian 
philosophers, respecting the fate of the soul. On 
this subject we have no precise and satisfactory 
information. The ancient writers have left us only 
a few obscure hints, which afford little more than a 
foundation for conjectures. 

A learned and ingenious author supposes that 
the Egyptians embalmed their dead for the sake of 
maintaining the connection between the soul and the 
body, and preventing the former from transmigrating. 
(C They were persuaded," he says, " that death did 
not separate the soul from the body, but that it 
remained attached to the mummy as long as the latter 
should continue entire. It was from this idea that 
these people took so many precautions to preserve 
their carcases from corruption, and to secure them 
from all accidents that might occasion their destruc- 
tion. Hence the care they gave themselves, and the 
expenses they underwent, to embalm the dead and 
deposit them in places secured from all insult. The 



196 OPINIONS RESPECTING THE DEAD. 

principal attention of the Egyptians was turned to 
this object. Thus they regarded their palaces and 
houses as inns, or receptacles calculated for a transient 
abode, and gave to their tombs the name of eternal 
habitations.* 

The President de Goguet appears to have had no 
other authority for this statement, than a remark of 
Servius, the Commentator on Virgil, who observes, 
" that the wise Egyptians took care to embalm their 
bodies, and deposit them in catacombs, in order that 
the soul might be preserved for a longtime in connec- 
tion with the body, and might not soon be alienated ; 
while the Romans, with an opposite design, committed 
the remains of their dead to the funeral pile, intend- 
ing that the vital spark might immediately be restored 
to the general element, or return to its pristine 
nature. "f 

This idea is a very ingenious one; but, from the 
manner in which Servius states it, it may well be 
doubted whether he had any better ground for his 
assertion than a specious conjecture; and if so, the 
opinion of the French antiquarian deserves equal 
credit with that of the Roman critic. 

There is a well-known passage in the Book of 
Ecclesiastes, which, if we understand it in the sense 
assigned to it by a late author, affords indirectly some 

* On the Origin of Laws, Arts, and Sciences, by the Presi- 
dent de Goguet, translated from the French, vol. iii. p. 68. 

f iEgyptii periti sapientiae condita diutius reservant corpora, 
scilicet ut anima multo tempore perduret, et corpori sit ob- 
noxia, nee cito ad alia transeat. Romani contra faciebant, 
comburentes cadavera ut statim anima in generalitatem, id est 
in suam rediret naturam. Servius ad iEneid. lib. iii. v. 6?. 



MOTIVES FOR EMBALMING BODIES. 197 

support to the conjecture of Servius. I allude to 
Solomon's celebrated picture of old age.* The passage 
is as follows. Ci Remember now thy Creator in the 
days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor 
the years draw nigh ; when thou shalt say I have no 
pleasure in them/' Then follows a description of the 
successive signs of decay and sickness, ending with 
death, " when man goeth to his long home, and the 
mourners go about the streets." The succeeding 
verses are supposed, by the ingenious Mr. Harmeir, to 
refer to the subsequent mouldering away of the 
mummy and destruction of the catacomb. <c When this 
last decay shall be complete, when the silver cord, the 
vestment of the corse, shall be loosed, and the golden 
bowl broken, and the pitcher broken at the fountain, 
and the wheel at the cistern ; then," it is added, 
Ci shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the 
spirit to God who gave it." 

If the Hebrews, in the time of Solomon, really 
entertained any such notion as this respecting the 
fate of the soul, they probably derived it from the 
Egyptians, and this circumstance would strongly 
confirm the idea of Servius. It must, however, be 
observed, that the foregoing passage in Ecclesiastes 
admits of a clear and satisfactory explanation, without 
referring to any such superstitious opinion, and that 
several very doubtful points require to be proved, 
before we can be authorised in adopting the conclu- 
sion of Mr. Harmer.f 

* Ecclesiastes, chap. xii. See Harmer's Observations on 
various Passages of Scripture, chap. viii. sect. 14. 

f The explanation given by Dr. Mead, in his Medica Sacra, 
is far more simple, and will probably be preferred by most 



198 OPINIONS RESPECTING THE DEAD. 

It has been further conjectured by a learned and 
judicious traveller, that the Egyptians caused their 
bodies to be embalmed, and placed in magnificent 
tombs, whose massive structure seemed calculated to 
defy the power of man and of the elements, in the 
hope of slumbering out, undisturbed, the fated period 
of three thousand years; after which they perhaps 
believed that the soul would return to animate the 
same body.* 

Thus the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, in 
its strictest sense, is imputed to this people. This 
idea affords an explanation of the anxiety which they 
have displayed for the protection of their mortal 
remains against decay, and the expenses lavished by 
their kings on the erection of the pyramids, and the 
decorating of their catacombs. But if so remarkable 
a doctrine was really prevalent among the Egyptians, 
we must suppose that they took extraordinary care to 
conceal it, since not the slightest hint respecting it 
has reached our times. Herodotus indeed mentions 
transmigration as the common lot of all souls what- 
soever.f cc The Egyptians/' says that historian, 
" affirm that Bacchus and Ceres (by which names he 
means Serapis and Isis) preside over the regions 
below ; and the same people are the first who advanced 
the doctrine that the soul of man is immortal, and after 
the death of the body passes into some other animal, 



persons of judgment who take the trouble to compare it with 
Mr. Harmer's. See Dr. Adam Clarke's Note on Harmer, 
vol. iii. p. 206. 

* iEgyptiaca, by W. Hamilton, Esq. 
t Herod, lib. ii. c. 23. 






MOTIVES FOR EMBALMING BODIES. 199 

which is born opportunely to receive it. They say 
that it transmigrates through all the creatures which 
inhabit the sea and the land, and through all winged 
animals; and having performed this circuit in the 
space of three thousand years, enters again into a 
human body." He adds, cc that some of the Greeks, 
both in earlier and later times, propounded this 
doctrine, as if it were their own, whose names he 
knew, but refrained from mentioning/' 

It is probable that Herodotus chiefly alluded in this 
place to Pythagoras,* who is well known to have 
been initiated in the secret doctrines of the Egyp- 
tians, and to have copied their customs in most 
respects very closely. But the accounts we have 
respecting the doctrine of Pythagoras are by no 
means favourable to the opinion that his instructors, 
the Egyptian priests, believed in the resurrection of 
the body; nor does it allow us to suppose they ex- 
pected, by embalming and preserving the dead, to 
secure the soul from the miseries of transmigration. 
Pythagoras even pretended that his own soul had 
transmigrated, and had animated successively different 
bodies. 

" Ev'n I, who these mysterious truths declare, 
Was once Euphorbus at the Trojan war: 
My name and lineage I remember well, 
And how in fight by Sparta's king I fell. 

* Pherecydes and Pythagoras are allowed to have studied 
the Egyptian philosophy in the sacerdotal colleges, before the 
invasion of that country by the Persians, while yet entire and 
unadulterated by foreign intercourse. See Brucker's Historia 
Critica Philosophise. 



200 OPINIONS RESPECTING THE DEAD. 

In Argive Juno's fane I late beheld 

My buckler hung on high, and own'd my shield. 

This death, so call'd, is but old matter drest 
In some new figure and a varied vest; 
Thus all things are but alter'd-^nothing dies, 
And here and there th' embodied spirit flies, 
By time, or force, or sickness dispossest, 
And lodges where it lights, in man or beast ! 
Or hunts without, till ready limbs it find, 
And actuates them according to their kind ; 
From tenement to tenement is toss'd. 
The soul is still the same; the figure lost; 
And, as the softened wax new seals receives, 
This face assumes and that impression leaves, 
Now call'd by one, now by another name; 
The form is only changed; the wax the same; 
So death, so call'd, can but the form deface, 
Th' immortal soul flies out in empty space, 
To seek her fortune in some other place."* 

On the whole, it appears to me much more probable 
that the views with which the Egyptians embalmed 
their bodies were more akin to those which rendered 
the Greeks and Romans so anxious to perform the 
usual rites of sepulture to their departed warriors, 
namely, an idea that these solemnities expedited the 
journey of the soul to the appointed region, where it 
was to receive judgment for its former deeds, and to 
have its future doom fixed accordingly. This seems 
to be implied by the prayer that is said to have been 
uttered by the embalmer in the name of the deceased, 
" entreating the divine powers to receive his soul into 
the region of the gods/'f This address has been 

* Ovid Metamorph. lib. xv. v. 158, Dryden's translation, 
t Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 10, 



MOTIVES FOR EMBALMING BODIES. £01 

preserved by Porphyry. As the passage containing it 
is curious, and tends to throw light on the religious 
ideas of the Egyptians, I shall insert a translation of 
the whole of it. 

" When those who have the care of the dead 
proceed to embalm the body of any person of respec- 
table rank, they first take out the contents of the 
belly, and place them in a separate vessel. After the 
other rites for the dead have been performed, one of 
the embalmers, laying his hand on the vessel, address- 
ing the Sun, utters on behalf of the deceased the 
following prayer, which Euphantus has translated 
from the original language into the Greek: c O thou 
Sun, our lord, and all ye gods who are the givers of 
life to men ! accept me, and receive me into the man- 
sions of the eternal gods; for I have worshipped 
piously, while I have lived in this world, those divini- 
ties whom my parents taught me to adore. I have 
ever honoured those parents who gave origin to my 
body and of other men I have neither killed any, nor 
robbed them of their treasure, nor inflicted upon them 
any grievous evil; but if I have done any thing inju- 
rious to my own life, either by eating or drinking any 
thing unlawfully, this offence has not been committed 
by me, but by what is contained in this chest;' 
meaning the intestines in the vessel, which is then 
thrown into the river. The body is afterwards 
regarded as pure, this apology having been made for 
its offences, and the embalmer prepares it according 
to the appointed rites/' The authenticity of this 
account is confirmed by Plutarch.* 

* Plut. Op. torn. ii. p. 996, p. 159. 
D D 



202 OPINIONS RESPECTING THE DEAD. 

That the Egyptians believed in the existence of a 
peculiar mansion appropriated to the dead, we learn 
from the passage cited above from Herodotus, and 
from Plutarch, who informs us " that they gave the 
name of Amenthes to that subterranean region, 
whither they imagined the souls of those who died 
to go after their decease; a name which signifies 
cc the receiver and giver."* From this designation 
it would appear that the region of the dead was a 
temporary receptacle whither the soul resorted imme- 
diately after quitting the body, and where it remained 
for a time, until it was sent back to enter again a 
mortal body, whether of a man or of some lower 
animal; and thus far the doctrine of the Egyptians 
diners not essentially from the Italian or Pythagorean 
dogma, which Virgil, the most learned poet of anti- 
quity, has set forth in the following beautiful lines, 
in connection with the ancient doctrine concerning 
the emanation of souls from the essence of the deity, 
or the spirit of the universe. 

Principio coelum, ac terras, camposque liquentes, 
Lucentemque globum Lunee, Titaniaque astra 
Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus 
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet. 
Inde hominum pecudumque genus, vitaeque volanturn, 
Et quae marmoreo fert monstra sub aequore pontus. 
Igneus est ollis vigor, et coelestis origo 
Seminibus : quantum non noxia corpora tardant, 
Terrenique hebetant artus, moribundaque membra. 
Hinc metuunt cupiuntque; dolent gaudentque j neque auras 
Respiciunt, clausse tenebris et carcere casco. 
Quin et supremo cum lumine vita reliquit, 

* Plut. de Isid. et Osir. cap. 29. 






ITALIAN OR PYTHAGOREAN DOGMA. 203 

Non tamen omne malum miseris, nee funditus omnes 
Corporese excedunt pestes ; penitusque necesse est 
Multa diu concreta modis inolescere miris. 
Ergo exercentur pcenis, veterumque malorum 
Supplicia expendunt. Alise panduntur inanes 
Suspensae ad ventos : aliis sub gurgite vasto 
Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni. 
Quisque suos patimur manes. Exinde per amplum 
Mittimur Elysium, et pauci lseta arva tenemus : 
Donee longa dies perfeeto temporis orbe 
Concretam exemit labem, purumque reliquit 
iEthereum sensum, atque aura'i simplicis ignem. 
Has omnesj ubi mille rotam volvere per annos, 
Lethaeum ad fluvium Deus evocat agmine magno : 
Scilicet immemores supera ut convexa revisant, 
Rursiis et incipiant in corpora velle reverti. 

" Know, first, that heav'n, and earth's compacted frame, 
And flowing waters, and the starry flame, 
And both the radiant lights, one common soul 
Inspires and feeds — *and animates the whole, 
This active mind, infused through all the space, 
Unites and mingles with the mighty mass. 
Hence men and beasts the breath of life obtain, 
And birds of air and monsters of the main. 
TV ethereal vigour is in all the same; 
And ev'ry soul is fill'd with equal flame — 
As much as earthy limbs, and gross allay 
Of mortal members subject to decay, 
Blunt not the beams of heaven and edge of day. 
From this coarse mixture of terrestrial parts, 
Desire and fear by turns possess their hearts, 
And grief, and joy : nor can the grov'ling mind, 
In the dark dungeon of the limbs confined, 
Assert the native skies, or own its heavenly kind : 
Nor death itself can wholly wash their stains ; 
But long-contracted filth even in the soul remains. 



204 EGYPTIAN DOCTRINE RESPECTING THE SOUL. 

The reliques of inveterate vice they wear ; 

And spots of sin obscene in every face appear. 

For this are various penances enjoin'd ; 

And some are hung to bleach upon the wind, 

Some plunged in waters, others purged in fires, 

Till all the dregs are drain'd, and all the rust expires. 

All have their manes, and those manes bear : 

The few, so cleansed, to these abodes repair, 

And breathe, in ample fields, the soft Elysian air. 

Then are they happy, when by length of time 

The scurf is worn away, of each committed crime ; 

No speck is left of their habitual stains; 

But the pure ether of the soul remains. 

But, when a thousand rolling years are past 

(So long their punishments and penance last), 

Whole droves of minds are, by the driving god, 

Compell'd to drink the deep Letheean flood, 

In large forgetful draughts to steep the cares 

Of their past labours and their irksome years, 

That, unremembering of its former pain, 

The soul may suffer mortal flesh again." 

This appears nearly to contain the sum of the doc- 
trine of the Egyptians respecting the soul. Amenthes, 
or the realm of the dead, over which Osiris presided in 
his infernal character,* received the souls for a time, 
and sent them forth again to repeat the round of 
transmigration. 

It remains to be inquired whether this rotation was 
eternal. Did the soul continue for ever to transmi- 
grate from man to the inferior animals, and from the 
inferior animals again to man, or was there a limit to 

* In Plate I. which is taken from the copy of an Egyptian 
manuscript on Papyrus, the infernal judgment of Sarapis seems 






LIMIT OF THE TRANSMIGRATION. 20o 

this predestined alternation? We are not directly 
informed what the Egyptians believed on this sub- 
ject, but we learn by inference that they set a limit 
to the metempsychosis. 

It appears that transmigration was regarded by 
all the ancient philosophers, who acknowledged this 
dogma, as a sort of purgatorial chastisement inflicted 
on the soul, as the consequence of previous delinquen- 
cies. The Pythagoreans taught that there were 
various orders of beings superior to men, whose souls 
had emanated from the deity.* The souls of the 
superior orders were condemned to enter into human 
bodies, and undergo on earth purgatorial afflictions. 
Human life itself was regarded as a state of penal 
degradation ;f but the humiliation of the soul did not 
end here: from man it descended to the meanest 
brutes, and, according to some, into plants,^ until, 
having gone through a career of punishment propor- 
tioned to its guilt, it again began to ascend and return 
towards the higher orders of living nature. This 
kind of chastisement is always spoken of as tem- 
porary, or finite, and hence it would appear that 



to be represented. The presiding god sits in the office of 
judge ; and Thoth, distinguished by the head of the Ibis, holds 
the tablet, which seems to contain a testimony respecting the 
actions of the dead ; while Anoubis, or Mercury the conductor, 
holds the scales, and seems prepared to execute the sentence. 

* Plutarch de Placit. Philos. i. cap. 8. 

f See a fragment of Cicero, preserved by St. Augustin, in 
his fourth book against Pelagius. 

X Diog. Laert. Vit. Empedoclis. ^Elian. de Animal, lib. 
xii. cap. 7. 



- 
206 LIMIT OF THE TRANSMIGRATION. 

the transmigration of souls must have had it§ 
limitation.* 

It appears from Pindar, that the soul was doomed 
to make this circuit at least thrice, before it escaped 
from the lower world, and became worthy to obtain 
entrance into the regions of blessed spirits. f 

But they who, in true virtue strong, 

The third purgation can endure, 

And keep their minds from fraudful wrong 
And guilt's contagion pure ; 

They through the starry paths of Jove, 

To Saturn's blissful seat remove ; 

Where fragrant breezes, vernal airs, 

Sweet children of the main, 

Purge the blest island from corroding cares ; 

And fan the bosom of each verdant plain, 

Whose fertile soil immortal fruitage bears ; 

Trees, from whose flaming branches flow, 

Arrayed in golden bloom, refulgent beams; 

And flowers of golden hue, that blow 

On the fresh borders of their parent streams. 

These by the blest, in solemn triumph worn, 

Their unpolluted hands and clustering locks adorn. 
Such is the righteous will, the high behest 
Of Rhadamanthus, ruler of the Blest. 

It would be an interesting inquiry, whether 
the Egyptians or any of the ancient fabulists be- 
lieved in the eternal existence of the soul. Cicero, 

* In the Clavis of Hermes, a book which, according to 
Eusebius, is an epitome of the lost books entitled Genica, 
the transmigration of souls into animals, is mentioned as a 
chastisement of sins. " cJ$- xaraSiKy *J/u%ijV hockt^." 

f Pindar. Od. Olymp. ii. West's translation. 



EMANATION AND REFUSION OF THE SOUL. 207 

and some other philosophers, deduced this dogma 
from the supposed indecerptibility of a being with- 
out parts, and from the incorruptibility of an etherial 
spirit; but it does not appear that any of the earlier 
sages, who drew their doctrines from mythology or 
tradition, fancied the soul to be immortal or eternal 
in its individual character. We learn from Cicero, 
and Diogenes Laertius, that the Stoical school, who 
derived their tenets from antiquity, maintained in 
general that the soul survives the body, but has a 
finite term of existence.* Cleanthes held that all 
souls will continue in a separate state, until the great 
catastrophe or conflagration of the universe, when all 
finite beings will be resolved into the divine essence 
from which they originally emanated, f Chrysippus 
taught that the souls of the wise and good alone 
enjoy so long a term of existence. At any rate, the 
period of the great cycle, or apocatastasis, was the 
utmost limit to which the individual existence of any 
finite being could extend. 

The doctrine of the emanation and refusion of the 
soul is several times alluded to by Euripides, who 
held the tenets of the Ionic sect, derived by the 
founders of that school from Egypt. The following 
passage from a fragment of the Chrysippus expresses 
it most clearly. 

Xcopsr S* 07rio-a) to. jutsv Ik yaiag 
<pvvr ug youav, rot o* onr alQepiov 

* Tusc. Quaest. lib. i. cap. 32. Diog. Laert. lib. vii. sect. 
156. 

t See Leland's Advantage and Necessity of the Christian 
Revelation 5 part iii. chap. 3. 



208 REFUSION OF THE SOUL. 

bAOL(TT0UTOL yOVV\$, Big OVf/UVlOV 

7toXov 7\X§e iroChW Qvrj(r>csi 8' ouosv 
rcou yiyvot^ivwv. 

Those things which sprang from the Earth go 
back again to the Earth ; those which spring from 
an etherial stock, return to the heavenly vault. 
Nothing perishes that has once had existence. 

It is alluded to, also, in a drama which is still extant : 

• •.... O voug 

olQolvoltoVj eig ahavarov alQip* sfJL'TrsG'wv* 

The intellect of the dead lives not, but has 
an immortal sense, being poured out into the 
immortal sether. 

Thisf doctrine was contained in the old Hermaic 
books, entitled " Genica " cited by Eusebius, but now 
lost. 

iC Oux yxouo-otg h ro7g yzvixoig" says Eusebius, cc or) 
olto \xidg "tyuyfjs T % T °v ftciVTog ttcmtou oli "tyv%ou harh." 
(C Have you not yet been informed by the Genica, that 
all individual souls are emanations from the one soul 
of the universe?" 

On this doctrine of emanation and refusion, which, 
as we have seen, was taught in Greece by the first 
mystics from Egypt, was founded probably at a late 
period the system of the Gnostics, which has been 
termed the oriental philosophy ; that of the Jewish 
Cabbalist, and those refined speculations, concerning 

* Fragment, Chrysippi. t Eurip. Helene. 1. 1022. 



DESCENT AND RE-ASCENT OP THE SOUL. 209 

the descent of the soul through the seven planetary 
spheres, and its re-ascent, which we find detailed in the 
writings of Celsus, Porphyry, and Macrobius.* What 
share the Egyptians had in these fictions it is difficult 
to say; but we find them in the Hermetic books, f and 
there is nothing in their nature or style that forbids 
the supposition that they had their origin in the myste- 
ries of Egypt. That they existed in a very remote age 
would seem probable, from the circumstance, remarked 
by Beausobre J that the vision of Jacob, related in 
Genesis, seems to contain an allusion to the phrase- 
ology, or style of representation adopted in them. 

The heavens were divided by these mystics into 
eight regions or spheres. The eighth, or highest 
sphere, was that of the fixed stars, the region of 
the divine and incorruptible aether, from which all 
souls had emanated. This was the native and origi- 
nal abode of all intelligent and spiritual essences. As 
long as they remained there, detached from all the im- 
perfections of matter, their nature was pure and 
unsullied. Certain souls, however, either impelled by 
wandering appetites, or driven as the due chastise- 
ment of offences, (for some maintained this opinion) 
descended into the lower world, and passing down 

* Celsus apud Origen. contra Cels. lib. vi. p. 290 ; edit. 
Cantab. Porpbyr. de Antro Nympharum, passim. Macrob. 
Somn. Scip. lib. i. 

f Particularly in the Pcemander. 

J Beausobre Hist, du Maniche'isme. torn. ii. 

The reader will find ample details on this mystical transit of 
souls through the heavenly spheres^ in Beausobre's Histoire 
du Manicheisme, and in the work of Dupuis, entitled " Origine 
de tous les Cultes," at the end of the fourth volume. 

E E 



210 DESCENT AND RE-ASCENT OP THE SOUL. 

through the seven spheres, named from the seven 
planets, acquired in this transit those vices and evil pro- 
pensities which were peculiar to each region. " This 
descent was described in a symbolical manner," as 
Origen informs us, ' ' by a ladder which was represented 
as reaching; from heaven to earth, and divided into 
seven stages, at each of which was figured a gate ; 
the eighth gate was at the top of the ladder, which 
belonged to the sphere of the celestial firmament."* 
There was another path for the ascent of souls from 
earth to heaven ; and at the summit was another 
gate, which was termed the gate of the gods, the 
former, by which the souls descended, was called 
the gate of men. The situations of these two gates 
are determined by Macrobius, who says they were at 
the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, where the galaxy 
intersects the zodiac. f There was also a gate belong- 
ing to each of the seven planetary spheres. 

When a soul had suffered the calamity of being- 
degraded from heaven to earth, it was only by purifying 
itself from the corrupt affections of the body that it 
could become fitted for its return to the celestial 
regions. For this purpose, according to some philo- 
sophers, three periods of transmigration were allowed ; 
and if it neglected to profit by these opportunities, 
there were some who maintained that its final doom 
was utter extinction. 

It may indeed be questioned whether this theory, 
in the form above detailed, was a genuine piece of 
Egyptian mythology. We may, however, with greater 

* Origen. loco supra citato. 

f Macrob. Somn. Scip. c. xii. lib. i. 



EGYPTIAN DOCTRINE RESPECTING THE SOUL. 211 

confidence; ascribe to the Egyptians the doctrine of 
emanation, and refusion, and purgatorial transmigra- 
tion, which we have illustrated by the foregoing 
extracts from Virgil, Pindar, and Euripides, and the 
dogmas of the Stoic and Pythagorean schools, 



SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER III. 

FURTHER ILLUSTRATION OF THE EGYPTIAN 
DOCTRINE. 

The ideas of the ancients,, and particularly of the 
Egyptians, respecting the fate of the soul, are still so 
much involved in obscurity, even after the most diligent 
research into antiquity, that it seems reasonable 
to look to distant quarters for some additional illus- 
tration. We know that the Egyptians, and the 
natives of Hindostan, have from immemorial time 
believed in the doctrine of Metempsychosis. This 
proves some connection in the metaphysical dogmas 
of the two nations, and suggests the advantage of 
inquiring into the opinions of the Brahmans respecting 
the state of the dead, and comparing the latter with 
the ideas of the Egyptians. 

There appears to be some degree of contradiction in 
the doctrines of the Egyptian priesthood, or at least in 
the tenets which the philosophical sects in Greece 
professed to have borrowed from them, with respect 
to the state of the soul in a future world, and to the 
individuality of its existence. 

As the Hindoos, as well as the Egyptians, held that 
there are repeated revolutions, bringing with them 
the destruction and restoration of worlds, in per- 
petual vicissitudes, and that at the end of each great 
cycle all beings that had emanated return into the 



214 ILLUSTRATION OF THE EGYPTIAN 

divine essence, it is obvious that neither party believed 
in the eternal existence of the soul in a state of 
distinct consciousness. At the termination of the 
great cycle, when the heavens themselves were to be 
dissolved and melt away, and nothing was to remain 
except the primeval spirit, both gods and men, and 
souls of inferior rank, were all absorbed. This, then, 
was the utmost limit of conscious existence. But the 
final absorption, as the Hindoos believe, may be 
anticipated; and besides this supreme happiness, this 
only true immortal ity, which yoguees and fanatical 
ascetics seek to attain, by voluntarily submitting to 
the most severe abstinences and most frightful tor- 
tures, there are, according to the Brahmans, various 
scales of beatitude or misery, of reward or penal 
chastisement, which may be enjoyed or suffered. 
Such is the doctrine of the Indian Brahmans ; and, 
from the observations in the foregoing chapter, it 
seems probable that the opinions of the old Egyptians, 
respecting the future condition of the soul, were 
modified in a similar way. 

According to the Sastras, there are four kinds of 
happiness after death. 1. That which is enjoyed in 
the heavens of the gods. 2. The honours and joys 
of deification. 3. The privilege of dwelling in the 
presence of the gods; and 4. Absorption. From the 
three first the soul descends to a subsequent birth. 
The last is a state of eternal reunion with the divine 
nature. " The three first are obtained by works ; 
the last by divine wisdom." 

The various heavens and hells of the Hindoo 
mythology resemble the classical fictions respecting 
the joys of the Elysian fields, or of the Isles 



DOCTRINE RESPECTING THE SOUL. 215 

of the Blessed, or the pains of Phlegethon. The 
dogma of absorption assumes a more philosophi- 
cal aspect. It is very similar, even in the manner 
of illustration, to the tenet of the Ionic philoso- 
phers, contained in the verses above cited from 
Euripides. The soul is liberated from its prison, and 
absorbed in the universal ocean of spirit or deity. 
" The Hindoos illustrate their idea on this subject, 
by comparing the soul to air confined in a vessel, 
which, when the vessel breaks, is immediately lost in 
the vast body of air which composes the atmosphere/'* 

If we may give credit in the passage we have cited 
from Servius, the Romans sought by their funereal rites 
to hasten the reunion of the soul with the universal 
spirit; while the Egyptians endeavoured to delay this 
event and to prolong the time of separate existence. 
We are informed that some of the Hindoos, as the wor- 
shippers of Vishnu, pray not for absorption, which they 
dread, as the loss of distinct and conscious being, but 
for the privilege of dwelling for ever in the heaven 
of their god, freed from the contingency of future 
births. 

It is impossible to decide what particular shades or 
varieties of these ideas were adopted by the followers 
of Hermes. It seems to be highly probable that they 
were variously blended by different sects in Egypt, as 
they are in the East. When men desert the region 
which is subjected to the dominion of their senses, 
and within the reach of their sober intellects, and give 
a loose flight to the imagination into the world of 

* See Rev. W. Ward's View of the Literature, History, 
and Religion of the Hindoos, vol. i. 



216 ILLUSTRATION OF THE EGYPTIAN 

invisible things, all the ideas they can form will be 
vague and fluctuating-, and we shall seldom find any 
dogma existing long without variation. 

The Hindoos believe, as did the Egyptians, 
Greeks, and Romans, that the funereal rites, which 
they term Sraddha, have an important effect on the 
destiny of the soul. The Sastras teach that the soul, 
immediately after death, becomes a ghost or ei preta," 
and remains inclosed in a diminutive body, in the 
custody of Yama, the judge of the dead. If the 
funereal rites, or Sraddha, be omitted, the soul cannot 
escape from the state of " preta :" if they are duly cele- 
brated, the soul at the end of a year is delivered 
from its prison, and ascends to a state of temporary 
happiness, whence it afterwards issues, to pass into 
a body appropriate to its merits. 

The judgment of its deserts is performed by 
Yama, who summons, as witnesses at his tribunal, 
Surya, the Sun ; Chandra, the Moon ; Pavana, Wind ; 
Agni, Fire; Akasa, iEther; Prit'hivi, Earth, and 
Varuna, Water; an invocation which forcibly reminds 
us of the custom, so frequently traced in the older 
Greekpoets, of calling upon the elements, as witnesses 
who were to appear at the final doom. The follow- 
ing lines of Homer recal this idea in the most 
striking manner : — 

Zsu irourzp, ?/ I8^flsv j&5&sa>v, x^ktts, [AsyiG-TS, 
'HsTuog 6* og 7TOLVT s<popcfg 3 xou ttolvt £7raxoveig 3 
xou TloTctpo), xou Youa 3 xou o) U7revsp()c xa^ovrag 
avQpa)7rovg tivog-Qov orig x £7riopxou o/xoVcnr), 

UjAslg (AOlpTVpOl S(FTS 3 <pl)AGL(T(reTE h' SpXlOL TTKrTOl* 

* Iliad I\ p. 276. See parallel passages in /Eschylus, Pro- 
metheus, v. 95 et seq. JEneid, jv. xii, &c. 



DOCTRINE RESPECTING THE SOUL. 217 

" Jupiter, ruling on Ida, most glorious, greatest ! 
and thou, Sun, who seest and hearest all things ! 
you Rivers ! and thou, Earth ! and ye who punish, 
in the realms below, those who violate the sanctity 
of oaths ! I call you to witness and maintain our 
faithful league." 

We have offered these observations, because the 
ideas of the Hindoos respecting the metempsychosis, 
and the final state of the soul, which bear a manifest 
resemblance to the Egyptian tenets, seem likely to 
account for the contradictions we have observed in the 
notions of the Greek philosophers and Egyptian priests, 
and to afford an outline that may unite the different 
fragments of their doctrine into an uniform and not 
wholly unconnected system. At present we do not 
pretend to say how far the analogy between the ideas 
of these two nations extended, but venture simply 
to hint^ by anticipation, that sufficient reason will 
hereafter be found for concluding the coincidence to 
be essential and fundamental. 



F F 



BOOK THE THIRD. 

ATTEMPT TO ILLUSTRATE THE EGYPTIAN 
MYTHOLOGY, BY COMPARING IT WITH 
THE SUPERSTITIONS OF THE EAST. 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTION. 

SECTION I. 

Preliminary Remarks. 

After the most careful analysis of the remains of 
the Egyptian mythology, we find ourselves unable to 
restore the whole system in that complete and con- 
sistent state in which it may be supposed to have 
originally existed. 

In the pursuit of this attempt, we labour under a 
peculiar disadvantage. The teachers of Egyptian 
philosophy have long ago disappeared. None of 
them yet survive to guide us through the mazes of 
their labyrinths. The whole race have become extinct, 
and their native literature has perished with them. 

Our countrymen in the East, who have made us 
acquainted with the sciences and religion of the 
Hindoos, entered upon their investigation under far 
more favourable auspices. They have been guided 
in their researches by native pundits, the descendants 
and successors of the old Brahmans ; who have been 
found able to interpret the sacred volumes of their 
ancient hierarchy. Accordingly, the success which 
has attended the labours of the Asiatic Society has 
surpassed the most sanguine expectations of the 
learned in Europe. 



222 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 

There are many subjects connected with the anti- 
quities of Egypt, and particularly with the history of 
the my thology and its progressive developement, which 
seem likely to remain for ever hidden in obscurity, 
unless we should find it possible to throw an indi- 
rect light upon them, derived from the ancient literature 
of India. But, before we are allowed to anticipate any 
important assistance from this resource, it may be 
thought incumbent upon us to afford something more 
than internal proof of the affinity we suppose to exist 
between the mythology of Egypt and the East, 

It has been frequently asserted, since the writings of 
Sir William Jones and his learned associates have ren- 
dered an acquaintance with the more striking features 
of the Indian idolatry very general, that these two 
systems were intimately connected. This conclusion, 
however, has lately been controverted ; and it has 
been asserted that the whole mythology of the 
Egyptians was indigenous, and distinct in its origin 
from any of the Asiatic superstitions. 

It must be confessed that no essential affinity has 
been traced between the languages of Egypt and of 
India • nor can we afford satisfactory proof, from au- 
thentic history or tradition, of any ancient intercourse 
between the natives of these countries, or demonstrate 
that they sprang from a common source. 

We must therefore rest the whole weight of our 
hypothesis upon internal evidence. It will be per- 
haps allowed, that this kind of testimony may, if 
sufficiently ample, supersede the necessity of any direct 
proof. I am indeed persuaded that this observation 
will apply to the present case, and that the mass of 
evidence resulting, even from a superficial comparison 



GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, ETC. 223 

of the Egyptian and Indian fables, is sufficient to 
evince their essential affinity. I have reason to believe 
that such of my readers as possess any acquaintance 
with the literature and mythology of the Hindoos, will 
already have recognized satisfactory proofs of this 
opinion; and that those who entertain any doubt will 
hereafter arrive at the same conclusion. This I shall 
for the present anticipate ; but, without resting any 
thing important upon mere presumption. I shall now 
proceed to an investigation, which will afford an 
opportunity of supporting the hypothesis I have 
assumed, and at the same time of availing myself 
of all the advantages that may be derived from it. 
As it was never my design to treat expressly on the 
fabulous religion of India, I shall only consider it in 
those points of view which are likely to display its 
relations to the Egyptian mythology. This object 
will be best attained by an historical survey of the 
philosophical systems and superstitions which have 
prevailed in the East from the most remote antiquity. 



SECTION II. 

General Observations on the History of the Indian Mythology, 

There is no author in our own language who has 
treated at length on the mythology of the Hindoos, in 
that point of view which is the most important for our 
present inquiry. I have no where found this subject 



224 GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, ETC. 

elucidated in a satisfactory manner, except in a short 
treatise, published in Germany by the learned Mr. F. 
Schlegel, on the £C Languages and Philosophy of the 
Eastern Nations." 

Several motives have determined me to rest satisfied 
for the present with a brief abstract of this author's 
survey of the subject under consideration. It appears 
impossible to state the facts which I wish to lay before 
my readers in a more lucid and at the same time 
compendious manner. If I attempted to condense 
in a short compass the information derived from 
different quarters, I should incur a suspicion of 
distorting the picture in order to derive advantages 
in the further prosecution of my argument. This will 
be avoided by the plan which 1 propose to follow. 

According to this author, the history of Oriental 
learning and superstition may be divided into four 
principal eras, which follow each other in chronolo- 
gical order. To the first period belong the doctrines 
of the emanation and transmigration of souls, which 
seem to be the foundation of the oldest system of 
philosophy prevalent in the East, as far as our know- 
ledge of Oriental history extends. The second era 
is that of astrolatry, including the barbarous wor- 
ship of nature, of the visible elements, and heavenly 
bodies. The third is distinguished by the dogma of 
two principles, or of the warfare between light and 
darkness, between the good and evil genius. The 
fourth is the age in which the doctrines or representa- 
tions of the Eastern schools acquire a more refined 
and metaphysical description, approximating, in some 
important traits, to the character of the European 
philosophy. This later period is distinguished by 



GENERAL ORSERVATIONS^ ETC. 225 

our author, with what degree of propriety we shall 
endeavour in the sequel to estimate, as the age of 
Pantheism. 

The following chapter contains a translation of 
the most important of Mr. Schlegel's remarks on the 
characteristic tenets of these different schools. 



G Q 






CHAPTER II. 

OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY OP THE HINDOO 
MYTHOLOGY. 

SECTION I. 

Doctrine of the Emanation and Transmigration of Souls, 

Among the systems of religion or philosophy to which 
Asia has given birth, none claims more indisputably 
an Indian origin ; none, with the exception of the 
Mosaic records, has higher pretensions to antiquity, 
than the doctrine of the emanation and wandering 
of souls. The foundations of this system are to be 
found in the Code of Menu, a relic of ancient times, 
which is at least of equal antiquity with the oldest 
specimens of European literature. This work has 
been, during some thousand years, as it is at the 
present day, the basis of the laws and institutions, 
and, we might almost say, of the daily habits of 
the Hindoos ; as evidently is it the principal foun- 
dation of the Indian sagas and mythology. Besides 
the information derived from the laws of Menu, 
we may yet expect to obtain some further insight 
into the principles of this doctrine from the Vedas ; 
and perhaps from the oldest school of Indian 
philosophy, which has been named Mimanso, and 
which acknowledges for its founder Yoimini, the 
author of the Samoveda. 



228 HISTORY OF THE HINDOO MYTHOLOGY. 

It will presently appear -how intimately the ema- 
nation of souls, in the original sense of that dogma, 
is connected with the metempsychosis. We must, 
indeed, withdraw our thoughts from those doctrines 
which were distinguished by this term among the 
Chaldeans or the Greeks of later times. Among the 
latter we no longer discover any system of doctrine in 
its original purity ; but a confused mixture of tenets, 
derived from various schools, obtrudes itself on our 
observation under the name of Oriental philosophy. 
We must be especially careful not to confound the 
doctrine of Emanation with Pantheism. To those 
who are only familiar with the more logical forms of 
the recent philosophy of Europe, the bolder figures 
and more lively expressions of the Oriental system 
may be mistaken for Pantheistic doctrines. These 
different schemes may, indeed, frequently be found 
connected in later times : yet the original difference 
is very essential, since in the old Indian system indi- 
viduality of existence is by no means subverted or 
denied : the reunion of particular beings with the 
divinity is only possible, and not necessarily implied. 
The perversely guilty are represented as remaining 
for ever cut off, and cast away ; or, if we adopt a more 
recent phraseology, which is however strictly congenial 
with these ancient doctrines, the eternity of hell -tor- 
ments is by no means irreconcilable with the system 
of emanation, but rather constitutes an essential part 
of it. With respect to the relations of Good and Evil, 
no doctrines can be more directly opposed to each 
other, than the system of emanation and that of 
pantheism. Pantheism teaches that every thing is 
good, because every being is a portion of the one 



DOCTRINE OF EMANATION AND TRANSMIGRATION. 229 

great soul, and all actions are performed by his 
immediate agency ; that every appearance of what 
is called wrong or evil is a mere deception. Hence 
the pernicious influence of this doctrine on life and 
manners ; since, whatever impression we may aim at 
producing by speciously sounding phrases, still, if the 
heart be only fakhful to this debasing philosophy, it will 
regard all human actions as indifferent; and the eter- 
nal distinction between good and evil, between right 
and wrong, will be confounded and obliterated. It 
is far otherwise with the doctrine of emanation, which 
describes cc every being as wretched by its own guilt, 
and the world itself as debased and corrupted, as a 
scene of ruin and lamentable decline from the beati- 
tude and perfection of that being from whose essence 
it emanated/' 

To contend against the truth of this system by 
logical arguments would be in vain, since it is not 
founded on a basis of reasoning, but has rather the 
form of poetical representation, or of a work of the 
imagination, like other figurative cosmogonies. Yet 
it well deserves to be termed a system, on account of the 
profound connection that prevails between its parts ; 
and it is partly to this circumstance, and partly to the 
supposed authority of ancient revelation, or a divine 
original, that we must attribute the powerful ascendancy 
it has held over its votaries during thousands of years. 
It also deserves our attention as displaying the most 
ancient belief of mankind with which we gain any 
acquaintance in the dim twilight of antiquity; as a 
doctrine which in the sequel has exercised a remark- 
able influence on the later developement and on 
the entire history of the human mind. In order to 



230 HISTORY OF THE HINDOO MYTHOLOGY. 

comprehend it, it is necessary to enter into the senti- 
ment in which it originates, and which pervades the 
whole of it. 

Menu, after describing the derivation of all the 
powers of nature, of all living creatures, whether 
animals or plants, for the latter are regarded as con- 
taining so many imprisoned souls, concludes with 
this general reflection : 

Ci These beings, involved in shades of multiform 
darkness as the recompense of past transgressions, 
are yet indued with inward conscience, and are sen- 
sible of happiness or pain." Thus bound in chains 
of darkness, and yet internally conscious of guilt and 
of the death which awaits them, they hasten ever 
on that career that is allotted to them towards the 
inevitable goal. 

ff In this tremendous scene, every soul, from Brahma 
to the herb of the field, wanders ever towards its 
doom ; in a world always tending to ruin and 
decay." 

In these words is expressed the genuine spirit, 
the prevailing sentiment of the whole system. 
If we collect whatever the poets of antiquity have 
expressed in proverbs or ejaculations concerning the 
misery of life, those rays of horror which, in the most 
deeply impressive tragedies, arise from the fearful 
idea of a blind fatality, and shed a gloom over the 
history of gods and men; if we combine all these 
reflections in one connected view, and change their 
transitory and poetical character into a form of settled 
and serious contemplation, we shall conceive the pe- 
culiar sentiment which pervades the philosophy of the 
ancient Hindoos." 

" Hence the doctrine of the four ages, of which the 



DOCTRINE OF EMANATION AND TRANSMIGRATION. 231 

succeeding is always in a certain proportion more 
depraved and more wretched than the former, till 
we arrive at the fourth period of consummate vice 
and misery, which is now present. On the same 
principle the gradation of the four classes or great 
castes in the social constitution of the Hindoos is often 
represented as a scale of progression towards earthly 
imperfection and debasement. Hence also the doc- 
trine of Troilokyon, or the three worlds, Troigunyon, 
or the three chief powers, the first of which is named 
(c Sotwo/' or truth ; the second <c Royo/' deceptive 
and splendid in appearance ; and the third " Torno," 
or darkness. In the emanations themselves also, 
whether they are spirits or the powers of external 
nature, the same law of progressive deterioration 
constantly prevails. 

" From the infinite essence of the eternal being, 
the great soul/' says Menu, " first shone forth, the 
first emanation; and from the Great Soul proceeded 
Consciousness. After Brahma himself has called forth 
the common powers of the rnind and of nature, Menu 
creates individual beings.* Bhrigu, in the succeeding 
explanation, describes the elements as proceeding 
from the soul, and as emanating one from the other 
in a certain order, according to the ideas that were 
entertained of their comparative dignity and perfec- 
tion. This law of progressive debasement and 
regular deterioration, and the sentiment of inward 
sorrow and remorse connected with the consciousness 
of guilt and the expectation of death, are the foun- 
dations of the oldest sagas. The particular steps 
in the scale of emanations are variously described 

* Menu; cap. i. v. 33. 



232 HISTORY OF THE HINDOO MYTHOLOGY. 

according to the arbitrary choice of the poetical 
cosmogonist." 

"Among the divinities of the Indian mythology,, 
Brahma is the god who more especially belongs to 
this system. Brahma, in that representation of hini 
which we find in the institutes of Menu, is the eternal 
soul, the infinite being, king and ruler of all nature, 
or, as he is called in scriptures of a later date, Father 
and Lord of the Universe. He is the inconceivable 
being, the alone self-existent, the divinity himself. The 
same description, in writings of a more recent period, 
is applied to Siva and Vishnu, by the respective 
worshippers of these gods: in the code of Menu 
Brahma holds the first place. The more limited 
interpretation of this divinity, as representing the 
earthly element, must be considered as the idea of a 
subsequent affe. 

ec Greatly as this doctrine has been corrupted by 
the wild fictions of a poetical imagination, and much 
as it has been contaminated by the most frightful 
and hideous superstitions, which have penetrated 
the whole philosophy of the Hindoos, and display 
themselves in the customs of their daily life, — yet we 
cannot refuse to admit that the ancient sages of India 
possessed some idea of the true God. All their 
scriptures are indeed full of phrases and expressions 
which declare this doctrine in as dignified, as clear, 
and exalted a manner, and in terms as profoundly 
scrutinized and as definite, as human language can 
adopt in reference to the nature of an infinite being. 
How has it come to pass that wisdom so exalted has 
mingled itself with such a mass of error and corruption ? 
It will be readily allowed that the imagination 



DOCTRINE OF EMANATION AND TRANSMIGRATION. 233 

could scarcely fill up the chasm which intervenes 
between the idea of divine beatitude and the imper- 
fections of the created world, in a more probable and 
natural way than by the hypothesis of emanations. 
This doctrine has not only been the basis of the 
oldest and most universal superstitions, but also a rich 
fund of poetry and fable. Every creature is represented 
by it as an efflux from the Deity; each being is only 
a more limited, confined, and obscured divinity: thus 
all nature is animated, and endowed with a soul; 
the world is a scene of hylozoism rather than of 
polytheism, or if we may use such an expression, an 
universe of gods. The multitude of the Indian deities 
is indeed innumerable. This infinite luxuriance of 
poetical fiction, not superadded from without, but 
native and original, distinguishes a mythology which 
springs from these fruitful sources, from the scanty 
and meagre superstitions which, among less cultivated 
nations, or, to speak more definitely, among nations 
further removed from the streams of ancient tradi- 
tion, are founded on the stories of ghosts or the souls 
of departed ancestors. Yet the deification of heroes 
can easily be combined with the idea of original 
emanations, and the Rishis of Menu's Cosmogony 
seem to afford a vestige of this mode of superstition 
in so remote a period. 5 '* 

The system of emanation is seen in the most 
favourable point of view, when we contemplate it as 
the doctrine of restitution. From the divine origin 
of man, it takes occasion to remind him of his resto- 
ration, and to set before him a re-union with the divinity 

* Here follow some remarks on the deification of heroes, which 
we omit ; as not particularly connected with our present subject. 

H H 



234 HISTORY OF THE HINDOO MYTHOLOGY. 

as the single object of his thoughts, and of all his 
exertions. Hence the religious interpretation of so 
many laws and customs among the Hindoos, and the 
sublime and serious import of all the regulations of 
their social life. Yet the genuine spirit may easily 
have vanished, so that nothing but the dead rites and 
mere pantomine remained, and superstition and error 
may at an early period have mingled themselves with 
institutions of a purer and better origin. 

From the ideas which pervade this system, respect- 
ing the gradation, and the various kinds of living and 
conscious beings, concealed under such multifarious 
forms, and their perpetual approximation towards or 
departnre from the common source, arose the fiction 
of Metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls. 
Closely associated with the same principle, and in 
some manner an essential part of it, is the belief in a 
former life, or in the pre-existence of souls, and the 
doctrine of abstract or more perfect ideas, derived 
from an obscure remembrance of divine perfections 
contemplated by the mind in its former state, which, 
in this world, are occasionally recalled by the sight of 
beautiful objects, in some measure partaking of the 
same qualities. This is a doctrine with which Calidas 
sports in the drama entitled Sacontala, and to it he makes 
a common reference, as to a well known and popular 
mode of thinking. Wherever we find the doctrine 
of transmigration not merely connected with a 
physical theory but with the idea of the moral de- 
gradation and misery of all beings, and the necessity 
of their purification and restoration to God, there we 
may be sure that it has been derived from the same 
source, and is of Indian origin. 



WORSHIP OF NATURE. 235 



SECTION II. 

Of the Belief in Astrology, and the barbarous Worship of 
Nature, 



If the system of emanation, by the moral sen- 
timent it inspires, and the doctrine of creation 
which it exhibits, claims a preference over simple 
pantheism, which, by presenting a merely negative 
and abstract idea of the infinite being, leads its votaries 
into a state of indifference with respect to morality, it 
cannot at the same time escape the reproach of 
fatalism, in the oldest form in which it presents itself 
to our view. The doctrine of predestination has 
been already mentioned, as contained in the poetical 
cosmogony of Menu, where the reader will find it 
fully developed. To the same system of ideas 
belongs the dogma of perpetual revolution, and 
of eternal alternations in the vigils and repose of the 
Infinite Being. 

cc The Being/' says Menu, ec whose powers are 
incomprehensible, having created me and this 
universe, again became absorbed in the supreme 
spirit, changing the time of energy for the hour of 
repose. " 

(C When that power awakes, then has this world 
its full expansion : when he slumbers with a tranquil 
spirit, then the whole system fades away." 

The author then further describes the absorption 
of all earthly beings into the essence of the Infinite. 



%36 SECOND ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

" While he reposes in a calm sleep, embodied 
spirits depart from their several acts." 

Arid again : 

" Thus, that power, alternately waking and re- 
posing, calls into life, and again destroys, in an 
eternal vicissitude, the whole universe of beings, 
whether moving or immovable : himself subject to 
no change." 

" Such revolutions* are without number : there 
are numberless creations and destructions. " 

" The supreme being performs all this again and 
again, as if in sport." 

The idea of an universe called into existence, 
without any design, by a merely sportive energy of 
the creative power, is nearly related to the cele- 
brated fiction of a perpetual revolution. 

In later systems, this is termed the alternate con- 
traction and expansion of the great power of nature, 
the pulsation of the soul of the world. 

The doctrine of Fatalism was expanded into an 
artificial system, which extended itself far among the 
oriental nations. Astrology, with all its circum- 
stances, its forebodings, auguries, lucky and unlucky 
days, incantations, and black or magical arts, con- 
stitute one of the most remarkable phenomena of 
antiquity, and one which has exercised an influence 
of incalculable extent on all ages, even to our recent 
times. 

Precisely with the same combinations, and not 
merely as a poetical or allegorical representation of 
the phaenomena of nature, we discover the worship 
of the heavenly bodies connected with that of brute 
animals among the old Egyptians. 

* Manwantaras. Menu, cap. i. 



WORSHIP OF NATURE. 237 

There are so many peculiarities in the nature of 
man, which are likely to seduce him from the adora- 
tion of his God to the worship of the visible elements 
of the universe, from the contemplation of the Creator 
to a blind admiration of his works, that it would be 
superfluous to trace the progress of this change. 
We find, in the ancient history of Asia, not obscure 
vestiges, but clear proofs of the wide extension of 
materialism ; but the materialism of the East bears a 
peculiar stamp, which distinguishes it from those doc- 
trines that have passed in Europe under the same name. 
We assign to it, in the historical series of oriental 
doctrines, that place which immediately succeeds the 
system of emanation and restitution. We might 
indeed discern some other intermediate grades, in 
the transition from a doctrine so sublime and spiritual 
to ideas so gross and sensual ; but this inquiry would 
be superfluous, since, in the oldest relics yet known 
of Indian antiquity, as in the cosmogony of Menu, 
there are clear vestiges of a true materialism. We 
may indeed regard the symbol of the mundane egg, 
which is also found in the Egyptian mythology, as the 
offspring of a sportive and childish fancy ; but the 
Matra, or seminal particles of the material fabric, 
require to be understood in a more philosophical sense. 
Whether in this instance, or in later expositions, they 
were atoms, in the sense of the Greek philosophers, 
and whether those Greeks were in the right, who 
maintained that the atomic doctrine had an eastern 
origin, we shall be better informed when the ideas of 
the Pashandists, Shoitists, aud the Charval, which are 
represented to us as a system of atheism, shall be 
further known. 



238 SECOND ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

Among the superstitions, indeed, of the ancient 
Indians, composed as they were of various parts, and 
developed by successive steps, the worship of the 
material elements of nature occupies but too ample a 
space. The rites of Siva, sometimes represented as 
the source or element of destruction, sometimes as the 
generative principle of the physical world, and regarded 
as a mere bestial or animal nature, together with 
those of the frightful Durga, or Kali, present us on 
every side the emblems of death and of lust, bloody 
human sacrifices, and bacchanalian revelry in the 
most disgusting mixture. What renders this system 
of materialism, and of the worship of nature, so 
appalling, and so widely distinguishes it from the 
sensual superstitions of mere savages, is the senti- 
ment of the vast and infinite, which pervades all the 
fictions of this era, and points backwards to their true 
original: the noblest and most sublime conceptions 
are easily deformed and distorted into horrible and 
gigantic prodigies. 

This worship of Nature extended itself so widely, 
that we must confine our survey of it to a few of the 
most striking facts. All those false gods, before whose 
shrines human blood has flowed in so many regions 
of the earth, betray marks of affinity to the Indian 
Siva and Kali : such are the Baal and Moloch of the 
Syrian and Phoenician tribes, among whom this de- 
praved superstition seems to have prevailed in an 
especial manner. To the same stock belongs the 
direful Hesus, at whose altars the ancient Gauls 
poured streams of human blood, which have had no 
parallel except in the history of the Mexicans. In 
the rites, also, of the old Egyptians, among the 



WORSHIP OF NATURE. 239 

worship of the stars and of living animals, the 
adoration of the Lingum and the all-productive Yoni 
held a far more conspicuous place than is commonly 
supposed. Herodotus deduces from Egypt the use of 
the Phallus, in the festivals and emblematic represen- 
tations of the Greeks. The sexual emblems which 
the conqueror Sesostris is said to have set up in 
various countries, may be more naturally and pro- 
bably derived from this source, and explained as 
the common symbols of superstition, than in the 
manner which the historian hints at, as testimonies of 
the masculine valour of some, and the effeminate 
weakness of other nations. The Phoenician Astarte, 
the Phrygian Cybele, the Ephesian Artemis, and 
even the German Hertha, are perhaps distinguished 
only in unessential points from the Indian Bhavani. 
The fundamental idea of an infinite power in Nature, 
endowed with the merely animal faculties of genera- 
tion, is the same in all these instances. In Babylon, 
and in all the countries dependant on the Babylonish 
empire, Mylitta is well known as a goddess of the 
same character, who, among the Armenians was 
termed Anaitis, and Alilath by the old Arabians ; and 
it is probable that the name of Yavani, in the 
books of the old Hindoos, was the designation, not so 
much of a particular people as of a religious sect, 
including all those nations to whom this mode of 
worship especially belonged. 

That the worship of the powers of Nature, mitigated 
indeed, and embellished, and exhibited in a less 
systematic form, constituted the foundation of the 
Greek and Roman religion, will not be disputed 
by any person who surveys the fables of the Olympian 



240 SECOND ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

gods with a more penetrating eye than that of a mere 
antiquarian. Among the Romans, indeed, this bar- 
barous superstition was corrected by a more severe 
morality, either derived from the relics of better 
times, or originating in the extraordinary wisdom of 
some ancient legislators. Among the Greeks, owing 
to the influence of climate and political circum- 
stances, the old superstition of the East gradually 
expanded itself into a more sprightly and graceful 
mythology, into the composition of which some 
ideas seem to have been introduced from a different 
and a better system, which we shall presently con- 
template. 

The doctrine of this period has, in common with the 
system of emanation, that infinite luxuriance of fancy 
which characterises the fictions of the East. The 
wild and bold spirit which succeeded to the gloom and 
sorrow of the older philosophy, is the peculiar source 
of all the gigantic prodigies of poetry or fable. In 
the same train followed the deification of extraordinary 
men, for the productive or destroying power of 
nature is conspicuously displayed, and seems as it were 
personified in heroes or public benefactors. The 
six-armed Kartikeya, or Skondoh, the god of war, is, 
in the Indian fables, the son and companion of Siva. 
Perhaps not only warriors, but also inventors of arts, 
were reckoned among the gods. That the first steps 
in exploring the secrets of nature and of science 
greatly flattered the pride of man, we may learn from 
the prodigies with which the historian finds the men- 
tion of them accompanied. Together with the visible 
powers of Nature, the wisdom and science which 
explored their qualities were also deified; such 



SYSTEM OF TWO PR1CCIPLES. 241 

perhaps was the origin of the Egyptian Hermes, and 
of the older Indian Buddha. Ganesa, another 
god of invention, was also the companion of Siva. 
Finally, I may remark that the monuments at Ellora, 
Elephanta, and other places, testify indisputably the 
high antiquity of this form of Indian superstition ; 
and that it is only on the principles of this doctrine 
that we can interpret the earliest efforts of sculpture 
among the Indians, the Egyptians, and the Greeks 
Even in the Vedas, it is said that human sacrifices 
are ordained to be performed before the bloody Kali. 



SECTION III. 

Of the Doctrine of Two Principles. 

We now enter upon a scene of more pleasing 
aspect. The system of Dualism, the oriental doctrine 
of two principles, and the eternal warfare between 
good and evil, claims this place in the order of time ; 
since it appears, wherever we meet with the traces of it 
have been set up in opposition to the theories hithertc 
described, as a restoration of the ancient doctrine, 
the original light of truth. The spirit of this system 
is altogether idealistic : the notion of self-existent 
conscious being is indeed common to all the Indian 
schools, as the derivation of all material natures from 
spiritual essences has the firmer and more extensive 
hold, the higher we ascend in the history of oriental 
philosophy; so that, in this sense, nearly all the doc- 
trines of the eastern sages may be termed idealistic. 

i i 



242 THIRD ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

But the peculiar agreement and coincidence of the 
doctrine we are now to consider, with what, in the 
West, has been termed Idealistic philosophy, consists 
in this circumstance, that energy and life are regarded 
by the sages of this school as the only principles essen- 
tially vital and operative ; while absolute repose and 
inertia are represented as negative elements, or the 
principles of death and annihilation. 

It is easy to suggest insurmountable objections 
to the doctrine of Dualism, considered as a philoso- 
phical theory. If, for example, it is supposed that the 
strife between the evil principle and the divine nature 
is to be eternal, a second power is introduced into the 
world, independent of the Deity, and, ifnotequalto him, 
yet in discordance with his government, and monotheism 
and subordination cease. If, on the other hand, as it 
is generally maintained, the evil principle is at length 
to be conquered and reclaimed, or Ahriman reconciled 
with Ormuzd, the idea of a perpetual warfare is 
in reality undermined, the whole scheme resolves 
itself, in the spirit of pantheism, into one nature, and 
the eternal enmity between good and evil vanishes. 
Notwithstanding these defects, it will be allowed that 
the intellectual religion of the Persians, with the 
exception of the Christian doctrine, as set forth in the 
Old Testament and perfected in the New, has greatly 
the advantage over all other oriental systems in sub- 
limity, in its comparative approximation to truth, and 
in moral tendency. 

Pantheism inevitably destroys the distinction be- 
tween good and evil, however strenuously its 
advocates may contend in words against this re- 
proach : the doctrine of emanation depresses the 



SYSTEM OF TWO PRINCIPLES. 243 

moral freedom of the will by the idea of an infinite 
degree of innate guilty and the belief that every 
being is predestined to crime and misery : the system 
of two principles, and the warfare between good and 
evil holds the middle place between these extremes : 
it becomes, itself, a powerful incentive to a similar 
contest, and a source of the purest morality. 

Among material objects this religion consecrates 
not the appalling symbols of destruction, of death, 
and of lust, but the most beautiful and beneficent of 
elements, fire and the solar light; and, above all, the 
energy of life and of the soul. The seven Amshas- 
pands, or Genii of the elements and chief powers of 
nature, stand like so many lords of the universe round 
the throne of their ruler, the noblest and first among 
his subjects. The heaven is filled by the sacred 
Feruers, or the divine prototypes and ideas of all 
created things. The star of day, Mithras, or the 
friend of mankind, is the mediator between them and 
the divinity. Bloody offerings disappear, and the 
ceremony of consecrating and distributing the pure 
Horn and Miezd on the altar, by the hands of the 
officiating priest, indicates a secret intercourse with 
God, through the means of the fairest productions of 
the earth. 

But the elements are not the only immediate objects 
of worship to the votaries of this religion. Heroes 
also receive veneration, not as fierce conquerors and 
destroyers, and as such claiming a place among the 
destructive agents of nature, but as sent from heaven 
to overcome ferocious giants, the powers of darkness, 
and infernal spirits. The contest between Iran and 
Turan represents on earth what the warfare of 



244 THIRD ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

Ormuzd and Ahriman, the good and evil genius,, 
is supposed to be in heaven. Feridun and Rustan, 
the celebrated champions of oriental song-, overcome 
the fierce pride of Zohak and Afrasiab ; but, more than 
all, Jemshid, the pattern of perfect kings, shines with 
unrivalled lustre amid the dark night of antiquity. 
A reign of infinite bliss, the seat of ever-beaming 
light, is essential to the doctrine of this school, as well 
as a scene of primitive blessedness and perfection, 
where Meshia and Meshianes wandered together in 
the garden of innocence; a state which it was the 
design of Zerdusht's religion to restore. 

A considerable portion, and certainly the best and 
most attractive part, of the Indian mythology belongs 
to this style of philosophy. For it is according to 
this manner that we must interpret the preserving, 
beneficent, all-pervading Vishnu, with all his accom- 
paniments. His consort is in every respect contrasted 
with the dreadful Kali, the ferocious companion of 
Siva. She is Padma, the lily of heaven, the blessed 
and all-blessing goddess ; Lakshmi or Sri, the daughter 
of the sea-god Varuna. Cama, the god of love, is 
generally found in their suite ; as well as Indra, the 
ruler of the firmament, the friend of man; with a host 
of happy and benevolent spirits, fairies, and celestial 
nymphs. Vishnu often appears on earth as a king or 
a sage, or a hero of wonderful exploits, and traverses 
all worlds with the design of banishing crimes, of 
conquering giants and the powers of evil, and of 
protecting all good men and genii, together with 
their chief, the benevolent Indra. 

Greatly as this idea has been deformed by the 
arbitrary efforts of the fancy, which represent the 



SYSTEM OF TWO PRINCIPLES. 245 

god, like another Proteus, assuming not only the hu- 
man form of a hero or sage, but even the shapes of a 
tortoise, a boar, a man-lion, and a fish ; yet the fun- 
damental idea of a god undergoing incarnation, and 
wandering on earth to inform the human race, to aid 
the virtuous and take vengeance on the wicked, is 
one which evinces, in the ancient Hindoos, no com- 
mon refinement of sentiment and depth of thought. 
We find, indeed, in other mythologies, fictions of 
heroes, who in glory and virtue approximate to the 
rank of the celestial gods ; warriors who, obeying a 
divine commission, fight ever against the wicked and 
in behalf of the virtuous ; but in no hero or Hercules 
of poetic fable do we recognise the idea of divine 
incarnation so expressly set forth as in the story of 
the Indian Rama, the gentle conqueror, whose volun- 
tary banishment into a scene of seclusion, together 
with his tragical or fortunate loves upon the Sita, 
have been the themes of so many beautiful pathetic 
strains. 

This hypothesis claims a higher place in our 
esteem, when we consider the exalted morality that 
displays itself in the lives and doctrines of the Indian 
hermits and munis, particularly as they are repre- 
sented in the Puranas. The rigour of those ancient 
penitents and rishis, who sought by the most severe 
self-torment to attain a higher degree of beatitude, 
and pretended to powers greater than nature had 
allotted them, withdraws now into the back ground ; 
and we observe examples of the meekest resignation 
to the will of the Supreme, and a temper full of gentle- 
ness and humility. 

As the worship of Vishnu occupies a considerable 



246 THIRD ERA OP MYTHOLOGY. 

place in the Vedas, a question here naturally offers 
itself, whether the ideal character of this divinity, as 
presented by these volumes, is the same with that por- 
trayed in the Puranas ? It is certain, at least, that the 
Vishnu of these poems has a very different description 
from the same god, as we find him in the institutes of 
Menu. But enough on this subject. What we already 
possess amply suffices to distinguish, in general out- 
lines, the various parts of the Indian system of doctrine, 
the different stages of developement and epochs of the 
Indian mythology, and to arrange them according 
to their natural tenour and relations. We cannot 
pretend to define, accurately, the particular era of 
each, or attempt to furnish a complete history of 
their progress. 

The doctrine of two principles, combined with the 
worship of the pure spirit of Nature, has not only been 
the source of a great part and by far the better portion 
of the Indian and Persian fables, but, even in the my- 
thologies of the Romans, the Greeks, and the Northern 
nations, there are many things which have first received 
their full and true explanation from the style and con- 
nexion of these ideas ; yet is this dogma not to be 
considered as a merely poetical fiction, but as also 
capable, in its origin, of a philosophical sense and 
interpretation. Even in the typical exhibitions 
of the Persians we may remark a certain relation of 
number among the emblematical figures, a plan of 
construction, the meaning and origin of which is 
to be sought in the duality of the primitive powers. 
That a philosophical system of this import and 
spirit was known in India is in the highest degree 
probable. Whether the Nyaya philosophy, the most 



SYSTEM OF TWO PRINCIPLES. 24T 

ancient, except the Mimansa, was founded, as the 
name seems to import, in such a principle of Dualism ; 
whether the two systems of the Madwa, and Rama- 
nuya, into which the followers of Vishnu are divided, 
and both of which are opposed to the Vedanti, belong 
to this school, future investigations will inform us; 
at the same time they will decide whether Zerdush 
adopted doctrines and representations derived from 
India, or the communication took place, as it is pro- 
bable, in a contrary direction. Since India has given 
so much to the rest of the world, may we not allow 
that she has received something in return ? At least* 
we should hold the possibility of such a case in our 
view, that we may not lay down a general observation 
for an invariable law, and thus expose ourselves to 
mistakes with respect to particular phaenomena. 

If any thing foreign has entered into the composi- 
tion of the Indian scriptures, it will doubtless be 
found chiefly in the Puranas, in which the religion and 
fable of Vishnu occupy the principal place. When, 
indeed, we recognise in the Puranas the events and 
personages of our sacred Scriptures, — not only such 
as are supposed to have become well known among 
various nations, as the history of Noah and the 
Deluge; but others also, which belong in a more 
peculiar manner to the Bible, such as the history of 
Job, — we are yet not allowed to adopt the conclusion 
that the sages and poets of India derived these rela- 
tions immediately from the books of the Old Testa- 
ment; since it is possible that greater portions of 
sacred tradition may have been common to the 
Hebrews and the Persians, and again to the Persians 
and Indians, than we are generally accustomed to 
believe. 



248 THIRD ERA OF MYTHOLOGY. 

However the doctrine of Dualism may have the 
advantage when compared with others, yet here,, as in 
other instances, where the light of the human facul- 
ties has not been maintained in its purity by a higher 
influence, error and superstition seem at an early 
period to have crept in ; and one false step, in those 
ancient times of energy and enthusiasm, was enough 
to pervert the most sublime doctrines into sources 
of abominable and atrocious practices. From a 
reverential regard to the purity and sanctity of the 
great elements of nature, a sentiment which carries 
with it not only an air of poetical elegance, but a 
moral association, arose an anxious care to avoid 
contaminating these sources of life by the contact 
of dead bodies. Hence it became, in the religion 
of the Persians, almost the greatest of crimes to 
lay a corpse in the earth, or to consume it with the 
still more sacred flame. Hence also arose the horrible 
custom of the ancient Magi, who exposed the remains 
of the deceased, to be torn to pieces by wild beasts, — 
a practice which is still maintained in Tibet, though 
the religion of that country has since changed, and 
has extended itself even to the distant regions of 
Kamtschatka: customs often retain their influence 
after the ordinances or opinions which first gave rise 
to them have long disappeared. 



SYSTEM OF PANTHEISM. 249 



SECTION IV. 

System of Pantheism. 

Among the philosophical systems of the East which 
are most important in an historical point of view on 
account of their widely-extended influence, one only 
remains to be considered, namely, the doctrine of 
Pantheism. The principles of this system are dis- 
cernible in the doctrines of the Indian Buddhists, which, 
about the commencement of the Christian era, that is, 
nearly a thousand years after their first rise, were 
introduced into Tibet and China ; which still prevail 
in Siam and the rest of the eastern peninsula, as well 
as in the island of Ceylon, and have extended them- 
selves far to the northward among the Tartar tribes. 
At least, the dogma that the universe is substantially 
nothing, to which the idea that the whole consists of 
but one being so naturally leads, is assigned to the 
Chinese Fo, as the fundamental tenet of his esoteric 
philosophy. When all individual essences are 
swallowed up in the abstract and negative conception 
of the Infinite Being, and their separate existence 
annihilated, this idea itself soon eludes our grasp, and 
resolves itself into nothing. 

It ought not to surprise the reader that we regard 
this philosophy as the latest of the Oriental systems. 
The proofs of this opinion must be given elsewhere. 
We shall only remark at present, that the lively and 
deep-rooted conviction of the existence of an Infinite 

K K 



250 FOURTH ERA OF 12YTH0L0GY. 

Being, and of his omnipotence,, must have become 
very much weakened and obscured, before it could 
resolve itself into such an airy and unreal phantom as 
the pantheistic idea of the one sole Being, which can 
scarcely be distinguished from absolute non-existence. 
All the other doctrines of the Oriental schools are 
founded on miracles and an appeal to revelation, 
however distorted by errors, and intermingled with 
fable; the system of Pantheism owes its origin to 
metaphysical refinement, and thus marks the transition 
from the Oriental to the European style of philoso- 
phising. It flatters the vanity as well as the indolence 
of the human mind: for when once the generalising 
conclusion, which comprehends all being, and anni- 
hilates all, is made, there is an end of inquiry ; all 
alterations of form and nature are regarded as mere 
deception. 

Among people of strong feelings, who imbibed the 
spirit of this doctrine with enthusiasm, it assumed a 
character of the most fearful fanaticism. Hence those 
prodigious spectacles, which astonish beholders, of 
Yoguees and Sannyasis, who macerate their bodies, 
and seek self-annihilation as the great object of their 
wishes. On the other hand, among more frigid or 
weaker temperaments, the maxim that all evil is merely 
apparent, because all existence, being essentially one, 
must be perfect in its nature, leads its votaries 
into a fallacious cheerfulness and acquiescence in 
themselves. 

That the doctrine of the Sane'hya* school is com- 
pletely Pantheistic, we may judge from the Bhagvat 

* The Sane'hya philosophy is the source whence the sect of 
Buddha seems to have borrowed its doctrines. It is vulgarly 



SYSTEM OF PANTHEISM. 251 

Gita; but we must allow that the author of this work 
seems not to have thoroughly understood it, or at least 
to have distorted its sense according to his own habits 
of thought. In the Bhagvat Gita,f and, as we may 
conjecture with probability, in all the other works 
ascribed to Vyasa, the doctrine of the Vedanti is 
prevalent, of which he was the author. Hence we 
are better acquainted with this than any other system 
of Indian philosophy. 

That this doctrine is nothing else than a pure ant! 
perfect Pantheism, we may perceive by the transla- 
tion; and it is still more clearly traced in the original. 
The Vedanti, as the name indicates, professes to be 
only an exposition of the ancient Indian doctrine set 
forth in the Vedas. The old text, like the ancient 
basis of the civil constitution, has been suffered to 
remain, but the new tenets have been, wherever this 
was possible, impressed upon it. All beings are re- 
solved into the great One, the Supreme, Brahme, or 
Ghuinyon, or the object of intellectual apprehension, 
which is here expressly defined to be a condition of 
indifference between existence and non-existence; 
between Sot and Osot. There are indeed passages in 
which the author seems to contend directly against 
the doctrine of the Veda. From the unmixed applause 

ascribed to Capila, but appears to have been the work of Iswara 
Crishna, who is stated to have received the doctrine from 
Capila through successive teachers. — Colebrooke on the 
Vedas, Asiatic Researches, vol. viii. p. 485. 

f The Bhagvat Gita is not really the work of Vyasa, though 
vulgarly ascribed to him. There is reason to believe it to be a 
production of a much later period. 



252 SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

which he bestows every where on the Sanc'hya 
philosophy, it appears that there is an essential 
agreement between this and the doctrine of his own 
school. 

We must wait for more satisfactory information con- 
cerning the real character of the Nyaya, Mimansa,* 
and Sanc'hya schools. The moral genius of the 
Mimansa, and the speculative character of the Sanc'- 
hya, agree well with the respective ages which we 
have allotted to them. At present we must be satisfied 
with having obtained from the Institutes of Menu 
a sufficient insight into the oldest doctrines of the 
Hindoos, and from the Bhagvat Gita a tolerably 
complete idea of the Vedanti, which must be regarded 
as the latest system in the whole succession of Indian 
literature and philosophy. 



SECTION V. 

Continuation of the same subject. Succession of Philosophical 
Doctrines and Mythologies in the East. 

The foregoing remarks on the successive deve- 
lopement of speculative doctrines and mythological 
representations in the East, have been confirmed in 
the most important points by subsequent inquiries, 

* The object of the Mimansa, says Colebrooke, is to establish 
the cogency of precepts contained in the Indian scriptures, and 
to furnish maxims for its interpretation ; and, for the same 
purpose, rules of reasoning, from which a system of logic is 
deducible. 



DOCTRINES IN THE EAST. 2-53 

and particularly by the researches of the Society of 
English Antiquarians at Calcutta. They agree in 
general with the conclusions which seem to result 
from all the data we possess relating to the history of 
Indian literature. A sufficient analysis of the Vedas, 
which we owe to the learned and judicious Mr. 
Colebrooke, and some further information concerning 
the Indian schools of philosophy, have elucidated 
several topics, respecting which Mr. Schlegel was 
obliged to content himself with conjectures. We are 
thus enabled to correct the foregoing outline of the 
history of Oriental philosophy in some particulars, 
and to arrive at satisfactory conclusions. 

The most important exception that occurs to the 
scheme of this author relates to the place he has 
assigned to Pantheism, and the strong line of dis- 
tinction he has drawn between that doctrine and the 
system of emanation. We learn from an examina- 
tion of the Vedas, that a style of representation to 
which the term Pantheism may with propriety be 
applied, is as ancient as the oldest relics of Indian 
learning. The Pantheism of the Vedas is not indeed 
of that refined and metaphysical character, which Mr. 
Schlegel regards as essentially belonging to this name, 
nor is it founded on those subtle abstractions which the 
Vedanti school displays; yet it may be truly desig- 
nated as Pantheism, since the conception of the 
Divine nature, which it presents, includes in itself the 
material universe. 

Before I proceed further, I shall illustrate these 
observations by some striking passages from the 
Vedas, in which the departments and elements of 
nature are identified with or rather included in the 



254 SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

description of the Deity. The following represen- 
tation occurs in the Yajur-veda. 

ec Fire is that (original cause) ; the Sun is that; so 
is Air ; so is the Moon ; such too is that pure Brahme ; 
and those waters and that lord of creatures. Moments 
proceed from that effulgent person, whom none can 
apprehend, above, around, or in the midst Of him 
whose glory is so great there is no image/' " Even 
he is the god who pervades all regions ; he is the first- 
born ; it is he who is in the womb ; he who is born ; 
and he who will be produced; he severally and uni- 
versally remains with all persons." 

' c He prior to whom nothing was born ; and who 
became all beings, &c." 

ce The wise man views that mysterious being, in 
whom the universe perpetually exists, resting in that 
sole support. In him this world is absorbed, from him 
it issues ; in creatures he is twined and woven, with 
various forms of existence." " Recognising heaven, 
earth, and sky to be him, knowing the worlds, disco- 
vering space and the solar orb to be the same, he 
views that being; he becomes that being; and is 
identified with him, on completing the broad web of 
the solemn sacrifice/'* 

The following curious passage from the White 
Yajur-veda, forming part of the hymn relating to the 
allegorical immolation of Narayana. exemplifies the 
extravagant figures contained in the Vedas, and other 
Indian cosmogonies. It begins by identifying the 
soul of man with the soul of the universe, which is the 
most characteristic tenet of the Pantheistic doctrine. 

* On the Vedas or Sacred Writings of the Hindoos. By 
H. T. Colebrooke, Esq. Asiat. Research, vol. viii. p. 432. 



DOCTRINES IK THE EAST. 255 

ci I. The embodied spirit, which hath a thousand 
heads, a thousand eyes, a thousand feet, stands in the 
human breast, while it totally pervades the earth. 

fC 2. That being is this universe, and all that has 
been, or will be ; he is that which grows by nourish- 
ment, and he is the distributor of immortality. 

iC 3. Such is his greatness, and therefore is he the 
most excellent embodied spirit; the elements of the 
universe are one portion of him, and three portions 
of him are immortality in heaven. 

" 4. That three-fold being rose above this world, 
and the single portion of him remained in this uni- 
verse, which consists of what does and what does not 
taste the reward of good and bad actions ; again he 
pervaded the universe. 

" 5. From him sprang Viraj, from whom the first 
man was produced, and he being successively re- 
produced, peopled the earth. 

Ci 6. Prom that single portion, surnamed the uni- 
versal sacrifice, was the holy oblation of butter and 
curds produced, and this did frame all cattle, wild and 
domestic, which are governed by instinct. 

<c 7. From that universal sacrifice were produced 
the strains of the Rich and Saman (Yedas) ; from him 
the sacred metres sprang; from him did the Yajush 
proceed. 

<c 8. From him were produced horses, &c. cows ? 
goats, and sheep. 

cf 9. Him the gods, the demigods named Sad'hya, 
and the holy sages, immolated as a victim on sacred 
grass; and thus performed a solemn act of religion. 

e( 10. Into how many portions did they divide this 
being, whom they immolated? What did his mouth 



256 SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

become? What are his arms, his thighs, his feet, 
now called? 

ec 1L His mouth became a priest ; his arm was made 
a soldier ; his thigh was transformed into a husband- 
man ; from his feet sprang the servile man. 

(i 12. The moon was produced from his mind, the 
sun sprang from his eye, air and breath proceeded 
from his ear, and fire rose from his mouth. 

<c 13. The subtle element was produced from his 
navel,, the sky from his head, the earth from his 
feet, and space from his ear. Thus did he frame 
worlds."* &c. 

Expressions of this character are not confined to a 
few passages. Similar representations abound in the 
oldest remains of Indian literature, and, indeed, per- 
vade all the scriptures of the Hindoos. The following 
is the general conclusion respecting the ancient 
doctrine of this people, which Mr. Colebrooke has 
deduced from an accurate examination of the Vedas 
and other sacred writings of the Indian priesthood. 

tc The real doctrine of the whole Indian Scripture 
is the unity of the Deity, in whom the universe is 
comprehended ; and the seeming polytheism which it 
exhibits, offers the elements and the stars and planets 
as gods/'f 

But though the oldest Hindoo Scriptures contain 
passages of this nature, which seem to identify the 
Deity with the world ; yet they also deliver explicitly 
the doctrine of creation in the true sense : that is, 

* On the Religious Ceremonies of the Hindus, and of the 
Brahmans especially; by H. T. Colebrooke, Esq. — Asiat. Res. 
vol. vii. p. 251. 

t Asiat. Res. vol. viii. p, 494. 



DOCTRINES IN THE EAST. 25T 

they declare the prior existence of an eternal and 
spiritual being ; who, by an act of his will, called forth 
the material universe, and gave origin to all subor- 
dinate souls, which they represent as emanating 
successively from the essence of the Supreme. 

This doctrine is delivered in the following pas- 
sage, cited from the Aitareya Aranya, a part o f the 
Rig-veda. 

" Originally this universe was indeed Soul only : 
nothing else whatsoever existed, either active or 
inactive. He thought, ' I will create worlds/ Thus 
he created these various worlds, water, light, mortal 
beings, and the waters. That water is the region 
above the heaven, which heaven upholds ; the atmos- 
phere comprises light; the earth is mortal, and the 
regions below are the waters/'* 

It is a remarkable circumstance, that the pantheis- 
tic representation of the divinity is found combined, or 
rather confounded, with a dogma so distinct from it, 
and which seems so opposite in its nature as the 
system of emanation. Yet such is the fact. The 
essential and original doctrine of the whole Indian 
system of mythology, on the various developement of 
which the tenets of all the different sects are founded, is 
the emanation of subordinate natures from a primeval 
and spiritual Being. The pantheistic representation of 
this Being cannot have been coeval with that system. 
It betrays a different style, or mode of philosophizing, 
and can only have had its origin in a corruption of the 
doctrine of emanation, or in the expansion of its prin- 
ciples into a new and distorted form. We shall 

* Asiat. Res. vol. viii. p. 421. 
L L 



258 SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

venture to consider the developement of this last 
system of ideas, as marking a second era in the history 
of oriental philosophy. 

We shall assign the third rank in the succession of 
religious or philosophical conceptions to Materialism, 
or the worship of the visible elements and depart- 
ments of the universe. This place seems, indeed, to 
belong to it, according to the natural and obvious 
progress of superstition. The connection of pan- 
theistic representations with the worship of Nature 
scarcely requires to be elucidated; the whole frame of 
the universe being included in the idea of the divine 
essence, and the departments of the world contem- 
plated as integral parts of it, the latter came, by a 
very easy transition, to be regarded as separate or 
subordinate gods. Hence the deification of the ele- 
ments and celestial bodies. But the worship of 
material objects, as derived from this source, bears a 
very different impression from the rude superstitions of 
barbarous people, who have no other conception of 
the Deity than as the visible orb of the Sun or Moon, 
to which they address their adorations, looking upon 
them as living bodies, and the voluntary and benefi- 
cent dispensers of light and heat. From the worship 
of the stars, according to the more philosophical or 
systematic ideas of those who regarded them as parti- 
cular portions of the animated and deified universe, 
there naturally originated certain notions respecting 
the influence of these agents on the destinies of 
mankind, and the revolutions of events. Thus 
judicial astrology and magical incantations became 
an appendage of this ancient superstition. 

All these varieties in the religion of the Hindoos 



DOCTRINES IN THE EAST. 259 

must be referred to a very remote era. The systems 
of emanation and pantheism have been traced already 
to the Vedas. The germs of a wild and sensual 
materialism are very conspicuous in the Institutes of 
Menu. 

The grosser and more revolting parts of the super- 
stitions of India appear to be of later date than the 
religion of the Vedas, and the mythology embodied in 
Menu's Cosmogony. I now refer to the worship of 
Siva and Bhavani, with all the obscene and atrociods 
circumstances which characterize it. The fabulous 
incarnations of Vishnu, and the whole mythology 
of the Puranas, also belong to this subsequent era. 
As these are very important points in the system 
I wish to found on this inquiry, I shall quote the 
following conclusions of Mr Colebrooke, which, as 
far as their application extends, confirm the observa- 
tions of the author from whom I have borrowed the 
foregoing sections. 

<c The three principal manifestations of the divinity/' 
says Mr. Colebrooke, ** with other personified attri- 
butes and energies, and most of the other gods of 
Hindoo mythology, are indeed mentioned, or at least 
indicated, in the Vedas. But the worship of deified 
heroes is no part of that system ; nor are the incar- 
nations of deities suggested in any other portion* of 

* This alludes to the Rama tapaniya, and Gopala tapaniya, 
which contain the stones of Rama and Crishna. Mr. Cole- 
brooke observes that " the former of these is inserted in all 
the collections of the Upanishads which he has seen : yet," he 
observes, " I am inclined to doubt their genuineness, and to 
suspect that they have been written in times modern, when 



260 SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

the text which I have yet seen; though such are 
sometimes hinted at by the commentators/' 

cc According to the notions which I entertain of 
the real history of the Hindoo religion, the worship 
of Rama and of Crishna by the Vaishnavas, and 
that of Mahadeva arid Bhavani by the Saivas 
and Sactas, have been generally introduced since 
the persecution of the Baudd 'has, and Jainas. The 
institutions of the Veda are anterior to Buddha, 
whose theology seems to have been borrowed 
from the system of Capila, and whose most con- 
spicuous practical doctrine is stated to have been 
the unlawfulness of killing animals, which in his 
opinion were too frequently slain for the purpose of 
eating their flesh, under the pretence of performing a 
sacrifice or Yajnya. The overthrow of the sect of 
Buddha, in India, has not effected the full revival of 
the religious system inculcated in the Vedas. Most 
of what is there taught is now obsolete ; and, in its 
stead, new orders of religious devotees have been 
instituted, and new forms of religious ceremonies 
have been established. Rituals, founded on the 
Puranas, and observances borrowed from a worse 
source, the Tantras, have in a great measure anti- 
quated the institutions of the Vedas. In particular, 
the sacrificing of animals before the idols of Cali has 
superseded the less sanguinary practice of the Yajnya, 

compared with the remainder of the Vedas. This suspicion is 
chiefly grounded on the opinion that the sects which now 
worship Rama and Crishna, as incarnations of Vishnu, are 
comparatively new. I have not found, in any other part of 
the Vedas, the least trace of such a worship." Asiat. Re- 
searches, vol. viii. p, 494. 



DOCTRINES IN THE EAST. 261 

and the adoration of Rama and Crishna has suc- 
ceeded to that of the elements and planets/'* 

But though the sects of Siva and Vishnu are sub- 
sequent in their origin to the institutions of Vedas, 
there is yet sufficient proof of their great antiquity. 
I need only allude to the ancient sculptures found in 
the Indian peninsula, and in the decorations of the 
subterranean temples. In the wonderful excavations 
at Elephanta and Ellora, the types of the worshippers 
of Siva and Bhavani are exhibited in colossal forms, 
as well as the figures of Crishna, and other incarna- 
tions of Vishnu. The flat roofs of these caverns, and 
every other circumstance connected with them, prove 
that their origin must be referred to a remote epoch. 
It is remarkable that the caves in Salsette, where 
Buddha is exhibited as the sole object of worship, 
have arched roofs, and are more modern in their 
style of decoration — a fact which indicates that the 
rites of the Saivas and Vaishnavas, in this part of 
India at least, preceded the era of the Buddhists. 

That the system of the Vedas, however, was long 
anterior to the rise of the superstition now prevalent, 
may well be allowed, without refusing to admit the 
inferences to which these considerations lead. The 
extravagant notions which have been maintained re- 
specting the vast antiquity of the Indian scriptures have 
been justly exploded and reprobated ; yet it appears that 
many writers have gone, with just as little support 
from the testimony of facts, to the contrary extreme. 
The most moderate and judicious conclusion, on this 
much disputed point, is that which Mr. Colebrooke 
has obtained from a careful examination of internal 

* Colebrooke ubi supra. 



26S SUCCESSION OF MYTHOLOGICAL 

evidence, and in particular from the treatises, of which 
one is annexed to each Veda, under the title of its 
Jyotish, explaining the adjustment of the calendar, for 
the purpose of fixing the proper periods for the per- 
formance of religious duties. i( These formules are 
adapted to the comparison of solar and lunar time 
with the vulgar or civil year, and were evidently 
formed in the infancy of astronomical knowledge/' 
From these considerations Mr. Colebrooke infers 
that the Vedas were arranged in their present form, 
in the fourteenth century before the Christian era, 
that is, about two hundred years later than the date of 
the Pentateuch of Moses. Several parts are evidently 
more modern ; but these may commonly be distin- 
guished in a satisfactory manner, and the texts which 
were compiled about the period above mentioned are 
themselves in general more ancient than the era when 
they were collected by Dwapayana, who was thence 
surnamed Vyasa, or the Compiler. 

On the reviewing the whole of the evidence as yet 
obtained, concerning the origin and relative antiquity 
of the different modes of Indian superstition and phi- 
losophy, it appears that the outline of their history, as 
attempted by Mr. Schlegel, has been confirmed and 
completed, in the most important parts, by further 
inquiry and consideration. The limitations it requires 
have been noticed, as well as the inversions, which seem 
necessary in order to reconcile it with historical truth. 
The oldest doctrine of the eastern schools is the 
system of Emanation and Metempsychosis. Blended 
with this, but probably subsequent to it, is Pantheism, 
which already makes its appearance in the Vedas. 
The latter ushered in Hylozoism, and the deification 



DOCTRINES IN THE EAST. 263 

of visible elements, or, in other words, the worship of 
Nature. On this system, blended, at a subsequent era, 
with the veneration of heroes as incarnations of the 
gods, were founded the superstitions of the Saivas or 
Vaishnavas. But these last forms of mythology are at 
least as ancient as those celebrated excavations in the 
Indian peninsula which have excited the astonishment 
of all travellers. The superstition of the Saivas, or the 
religion of Siva, Mahadeva, and Bhavani, consists, as 
it is well known, of the worship of the elements, and 
particularly of the destructive and reproductive 
powers of Nature, connected with the display of con- 
secrated symbols, the lingum and the yoni ; that of 
the Vaishnavas, or followers of Vishnu, of the rites 
and observances founded on the Puranas which relate 
to the incarnations of their god. 

Though the three manifestations of the deity are 
mentioned in the Vedas and other remains of remote 
antiquity, yet, as Brahma is the most conspicuous 
divinity in the scriptures of this era, we shall distin- 
guish the earliest forms of Indian mythology as the 
religion of Brahma. The later class of superstitions 
are already designated in the practice of the sects, 
who devote themselves respectively to Siva and 
Vishnu. 



CHAPTER III. 

COMPARISON BETWEEN THE SUCCESSION OF SUPERSTI- 
TIONS IN THE EAST, AND THE HISTORY OF MYTHOLOGY 
IN EGYPT. 

SECTION I. 

General Resemblance between the Indian and Egyptian 
Mythologies in the Conception of the Divine Nature. 

We shall now examine the relations between the 
mythologies of India and Egypt, and inquire whether 
there are traces of a succession of periods and a gra- 
dual change of doctrines in the history of the latter, 
which bear any analogy to the revolution we have 
observed in the Eastern schools. This investigation 
cannot fail to throw light on the connection and 
mutual relations of the various parts of the Egyptian 
mythology. At the same time it will afford a complete 
solution of the problem, whether any essential affinity 
existed originally between these systems. 

The first question that offers itself is, To what 
period in the history of the Indian mythology do the 
superstitions of Egypt bear the nearest relation? 

I think it will appear evident that the more striking 
and popular of .these superstitions correspond in ge- 
neral with those which belong to the third and fourth 
periods in the history of Eastern doctrines, and that 
the whole of the Egyptian mythology may be referred 

M M 



266 SIMILAR IDEAS AND REPRESENTATIONS 

to the transition from the more ancient into the later 
system. At the same time I think we may trace, in 
the doctrines and representations of the Theban and 
Memphite hierarchy, a transition from an older to a 
newer style of philosophy and superstition, bearing 
a near analogy to the gradual revolution which took 
place in the religion of the Brahmans. 

But before we proceed further into this subject, let 
us mark the general resemblance, with respect to the 
conception and representation of the deity, which 
displays itself in the religion of the Indians and Egyp- 
tians. In both systems the idea of God was formed, 
not by a philosophical abstraction, or by inferences 
from effects to causes, but was, in fact, a sort of 
prosopopoeia of Nature. The idea of the Divinity 
included in itself the whole universe. We shall here 
recall to our reader the description of Serapis, cited 
in a former Book, in which the Egyptian pantheism is 
strikingly characterized, and shall then cite a paral- 
lel passage from the Vedas. Serapis is thus described 
by the oracle which was interrogated respecting the 
nature of the god. 

" Learn thus the description of my nature and 
divine attributes. The canopy of heaven is my head, 
the sea is my belly, the earth constitutes my feet, 
my ears are aloft in the etherial vault, and mine eye 
is the splendid and far-shining solar lamp.'' 

The following is a description of the creation of 
Purusha, the first embodied being, from the Aitareya 
Aranya, which is a portion of the Rig-veda. 

<f He drew from the waters and framed Purusha. 
He viewed him ; and of that being, so contemplated, 
the mouth opened as an egg. From the mouth speech 



OF THE DIVINITY. 267 

issued ; from speech fire proceeded. The nostrils 
spread : from the nostrils breath passed ; from breath 
air was propagated. The eyes opened : from the 
eyes a glance sprung ; from that glance the sun was 
produced. The ears dilated : from the ears came 
hearkening ; and from that the regions of space. 
The skin expanded : from the skin hair arose ; from 
that grew herbs and trees. The breast opened: from 
the breast mind issued ; and from mind the moon/' 
&c. 

" The deities, that is, the elements, fell into the 
ocean. " They demanded a receptacle, and Brahma 
shewed them thehuman form. ec He bade them occupy 
their respective places. Fire, becoming speech, entered 
the mouth. x\ir, becoming breath, proceeded to the 
nostrils. The sun, bringing light, penetrated the 
eyes. Space became hearing and occupied the ears. 
Herbs and trees became hair, and filled the skin. The 
moon, becoming mind, entered the breast." 

The leading idea, in both these descriptions, is the 
same. It is a comparison of man, as a microcosm, 
with the universe, as a megacosm, or the converse. 
The style of the figures is in both alike.* 

* This strange and uncouth assemblage of ideas may be 
recognised in the mythology of the ancient German nations. 
Yme the great First-born, was a microcosm of the universe. 
He was slain by the gods Odin, Vili, and Ve, the sacred triad 
of the Scandinavian mythology, who, from the body and blood 
of the giant, created all things. 

" Of Yme's flesh was the earth created j 
Of his sweat, the sea j the hills, of his bones ; 
The meadows, of his hair j and of his head, the heavens ; 



268 SIMILAR IDEAS AND REPRESENTATIONS 

We find in the Bhagvat Gita a still more charac- 
teristic specimen of the pantheistic description of the 
divinity. 

" The son of Pandoo then beheld, within the body 

OF THE GOD OF GODS, STANDING TOGETHER, THE WHOLE 

universe, divided into its vast variety. He was over- 
whelmed with wonder, and every hair was raised on 
end. He bowed down before the god, and thus 
addressed him with joined hands. ' I behold, O 
god ! within thy breast, the devas assembled, and 
every tribe of beings. I see Brahma, that deity 
sitting on his lotus throne : all the rishis and hea- 
venly uragas. I see thyself, on all sides, of infinite 
shape, formed with abundant arms, and bellies, and 
mouths, and eyes ; but I can neither discover thy 
beginning, thy middle, nor thine end. O universal 
lord ! form of the universe ! 1 see thee with a 
crown, and armed with club and chakra, a mass of 
glory darting refulgent beams around. I see thee, 
difficult to be seen, shining on all sides with light 
immeasurable, like the ardent fire or glorious sun. 
I see thee of valour infinite; the sun and moon thy 
eyes; thy mouth a flaming fire, and the whole world 
shining with reflected glory. The space between 
the heavens and earth is possessed by thee alone, and 
every point around/ " * 

We must not regard these descriptions as peculiar 

And of his eye-brows, the blithe gods made 
Midgard, for the sons of men j and of his brains 
Were all the hard-tempered clouds created." 

Herbert's Translations from the Icelandic, vol. i. p. 27. 

* Ward on the History, Religion, &c. of the Hindoos, 
vol. i. p. 85 of the Introduction. 



OF THE DIVINITY. 269 

to any one god in the Indian or Egyptian theocracy. 
They appear to be rather the mode in which the 
mystics of both nations represented the divinity, and 
are appropriated in turns to various imaginary names. 



SECTION II. 

Of the Forms of Eastern Mythology, to which the Superstition 
of Egypt is particularly related. 

The assemblage of splendid ceremonies and em- 
blematical or figurative representations which formed 
so remarkable a feature in the history of the ancient 
Egyptians, bears in many respects a near resemblance 
to those superstitious rites and doctrines which we 
have supposed to belong to the third and fourth eras 
of Eastern mythology. In India, at this period, we lose 
sight of all abstract ideas of creation or emanation ; 
we contemplate the material universe as an infinite 
frame endued with a living nature, of which intellec- 
tual or moral attributes form no part, while the 
merely animal or sensual powers are every where 
celebrated and exhibited in all the various forms which 
the luxuriance of a corrupt imagination could deve- 
lope. Destruction, death, and all its terrors, every 
where stalk forth in the most appalling shapes. Lust 
and wanton revelry exhibit, in all directions, the most 
obscene and sensual emblems. Such is the religion of 
the destroying and generating Siva, and of Durga or 
Bhavani, his frightful or lascivious consort ; and such 
was the religion of Osiris and Isis. 



27t) EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN 

The most striking features in nature are the pro- 
cesses of destruction and renovation. It might be 
expected that the worshippers of nature would per- 
sonify the powers that were imagined to give rise to 
these phenomena. They have in fact done so, and 
have exhibited the same scenes, with some accidental 
differences in Egypt, and in India. 

The gods which compose the Egyptian Triad are 
personifications of the generative, the destructive, and 
the renovating or preserving powers; and the Tri- 
murti of the Hindoos represents nearly the same qua- 
lities. The chief circumstance which distinguishes 
the theogonies of the two countries is the following. 
The Hindoos personified destruction as well as 
generation ; but in the Indian prosopopoeia, by some 
accident, these opposite characters are associated in 
one being. The frightful murderous Rudra is the 
same god as Iswara, the begetter of all. Also the 
black Kali, or Chamunda, whose image wore a 
necklace of human skulls, and is decorated with 
wreaths composed of the bloody ears and noses of 
captives,* is the same goddess as Bhavani, the all- 
teeming mother of creatures. 

In Egypt, these attributes were more correctly divi- 
ded. Osiris was the generator ; he appeared in his 
true and distinctive function, when preceded by the 
Bacchanalian pomp, bearing aloft the Phalli, or that 
curious wicker image, which so strikingly portrayed 
the object of his existence or deification. f The 
malignant destroyer, Typhon, the murderous enemy 

* Wilks's History of the Mysore, vol. i. 
t See Herodotus, lib.ii. 



POLYTHEISM COMPARED. 271 

of gods and men, the personification of physical evil, of 
death and destruction, is never identified with Osiris, 
though they were twin-brothers, but is always his 
adversary. But in the representation of the female 
power, the Egyptians made the same oversight as the 
Hindoos. Isis, in one character, expresses the uni- 
versal mother, and corresponds exactly with Isani or 
Bhavani ; in another, as the vindictive Tithrambo or 
Erinnys, she differs little from Kali. 

If these circumstances be kept in mind, we shall 
observe a strict analogy between the characters of 
Siva the generator, and Osiris, and between Siva the 
destroyer, and Typhon ; as we find the consort of 
Siva in her double character to correspond in both 
with the double attributes of Isis. Iswara or cc lord," 
is the epithet of Siva, regarded as the chief power or 
lord of nature. Osiris or Ysiris as Hellanicus wrote 
the Egyptian name, was the god at whose birth a voice 
was heard to declare, that the " lord of all nature 
sprang forth to light. " The analogy of names alone 
is a trifling circumstance : it may arise from accident, 
and cannot furnish a foundation for any important 
inference; but, when connected with a strongly- 
marked resemblance, and even with identity of cha- 
racter, it deserves notice. 

One of the names of Siva is Tritochana, which 
means Three-eyed: Trioculus. Polyopthalmos, or 
<c Many-eyed," is the interpretation assigned by 
Diodorus and Plutarch to the name of Osiris. 

Sir William Jones, and many ingenious writers 
who have followed him, have been very successful in 
tracing coincidences between particular stories com- 
prised in the Indian mythology, and the fables of 



272 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN 

other systems. This is not my object at present, and 
I shall merely point out some leading characters of 
resemblance in general principles, illustrating them 
with some particulars, but in as brief a manner as 
possible. 

1. Of Siva, as the god of Reproduction, compared with Osiris, 

Siva is represented, by the Hindoos, with one head, 
three eyes, and two arms, riding on a bull, covered 
with ashes, naked, his eyes inflamed with intoxica- 
ting herbs, having in one hand a horn, and in the 
other a drum.* Sarapis was figured by the Egyptians, 
as holding in one hand a crozier, in the other a flail. 
One of his forms was a bull. 

Osiris, as identified with Bacchus, is the god of all 
sensual revelry ; among the Greeks, of wine and 
intoxication. The tiger-skin was the appropriate 
garb of Bacchus. 

Siva is often portrayed wearing a tiger-skin. He 
sits upon a lotus. 

Osiris was clothed with the skin of a fawn, the spots 
being emblematical of his numerous eyes.f The infant 
Harpocrates, whose close relation to Osiris we have 
above remarked, was painted sitting upon a lotus. J 

Siva is very commonly worshipped under the form 
of the lingum, which is found in the adyta of the 
Eastern temples, and is suspended from the necks of 
Siva's votaries. This emblem performs a conspi- 
cuous part in the public honours and festivities of 
Siva, which bear a strong resemblance in many 

* Ward, vol. i. p. 17. f Plut. de Isid. 

% Cuper's Harpocrates. 



OSIRIS AND ISWARA THE RESTORER. 273 

particulars to the famous Phallic or Ithyphallic pomps 
and representations. On this subject it is unneces- 
sary to enlarge. The reader will find it sufficiently 
discussed in the second volume of the Rev. Mr. 
Maurice's Indian Antiquities. 

Siva,, as the god of generation, rode upon a bull.* 
He has the same attitude when regarded as the 
supreme judge, the author of legislation and civil 
order.f The bull of Iswara is celebrated throughout 
India. This god is worshipped by the people on the 
Caveri; and a number of bulls, which represent him, 
roam about the country, and receive extravagant 

* Sir W. Jones,, on the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India. 
Asiat. Researches, vol. i. 

f The following text is ordered to be repeated by a Hindoo, 
who has unwarily eaten or drunk what is forbidden, as an 
atonement; after performing the ceremony, the Gayatri is 
to be repeated eight hundred times. " The bull roars; he has 
four horns, three feet, two heads, seven hands, and is bound 
by a three-fold ligature; he is the mighty resplendent being, 
and pervades mortal men." u The bull" says the Com- 
mentary, " is Justice personified. His four horns are the 
Brahman, or superintending priest; the Udgatri, or chanter of 
the Sama-Veda^ &c. His three feet are the three Vedas." Mr. 
H. T. Cclebrooke, Asiat. Research, vol. v. p. 356. 

A marked resemblance may be traced between Sarapis, the 
Egyptian Pluto, the ruler of the infernal regions, who was a 
form of Osiris^ and the Indian Yarna, King of Hell. Yama is 
figured sitting on a buffalo, with a club in his right hand. 
His dreadful teeth, grim aspect, and terrific shape, fill the 
inhabitants of the three worlds with terror.* He is guarded 
by two dogs, one called Syama, or black; and the other, 
Cerbura, or variegated, who has three heads. f 

* Ward. f Wilford. 

N N 



&74 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

honours. The Siva-bhactar caste professes to owe 
its institution to the appearance of Baswa, the sacred 
bull of Iswara, and they relate many instances of the 
benefits conferred by this divine animal on the human 
race. At certain periods, they say that the world 
is overwhelmed by floods. The bull stands in the 
midst of the deluge, which ascends only half way up 
his thighs. Men and other animals are saved by 
laying hold of his hair.* 

The Egyptian bulls, Apis and Mnevis, held a similar 
relation to Osiris. Mnevis was the first legislator of 
Egypt; and hence all the ancient lawgivers of mytho- 
logy appeared in a tauriform shape, or had some 
fiction connected with their stories, that related to 
bulls. Such was the Minotaur of Minos, the law- 
giver of Crete. 

We have before observed, that water, as the 
element which in a peculiar manner fosters and seems 
to sustain all the fruits of the earth, w r as regarded by 
the Egyptians as the chief cause of all production, 
as the great genial principle of nature. As such it 
was the gift and the emblem of Osiris. Hence a vessel 
of water was carried in the processions of this god. 
In India, Siva is often worshipped in the form of a 
pan of water. 

The Nile itself was called (i an emanation from 
Osiris," as flowing from the god.f So the Ganges is 
represented as flowing down from the head of Siva, 

* Journey through Mysore, Canara, and Malabar, by Dr. 
Francis Buchanan, M. D. 

f Plutarch, ubi supra. The Nile is called " Oa-iptSos 
AtfQppQri." 



TYPHON, AND SIVA THE DESTROYER. 275 

a fiction very celebrated among the poets and painters 
of India.* 



2. Siva, as the God of Destniction, compared ivith Typhon. 

Iswara, the god of generation, in many respects 
corresponds as we have seen, with Osiris. As a 
personification of the destructive powers of nature, he 
represents the same character as Typhon, and resem- 
bles him perhaps still more closely than in his former 
character with Osiris. 

The images of Siva, in the form of Maha-Kaia, the 
great destroyer, remind us of the figures of Typhon. 
They represent a smoke-coloured boy with three eyes 
clothed in red garments. His hair stands erect ; his 
teeth are very large; he wears a necklace of human 
skulls, and a large turban of his own hair; in one 
hand he holds a stick, and in the other the foot of a 

* Sir W. Jones introduces this fable in his hymn to Ganga. 

ft Above the reach of mortal ken, 

On blest Coilasa's top, where every stem 

Glow'd with a vegetable gem, 

Mahesa stood, the dread and joy of men; 

While Parvati, to gain a boon, 

Fix'd on his locks a beamy moon, 

And hid his frontal eye in jocund play. 

With reluctant sweet delay. 

All Nature straight was lock'd in dun eclipse, 

Till Brahmans pure, with hallow'd lips 

And warbled prayers, restored the day; 
When Ganga from his brows with heav'nly fingers prest, 
Sprang radiant and descending graced the caverns of the 
West." 



276 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

bedstead ; he has a large belly, and makes a very 
terrific appearance.* 

The Egyptian Typhon was a maleficent daemon, 
who was blamed for all the misfortunes that occurred. 
Like the Lok of the Scandinavians, he was a sort of 
Blight-crop, who was perpetually contriving feats of 
mischief and deception. 

Such, precisely, is the character of Rudra, the 
destroying Siva, as described in the following prayer. 
(c O Rudra! hurt not our offspring and descendants; 
abridge not the period of our lives ; destroy not our 
cows; kill not our horses; slay not our proud and 
irritable folks; because, holding oblations, we always 
pray to thee."f 

Typhon, the enemy of the solar god Osiris, was 
worshipped, as we have before said, under the form 
of a Crocodile, and oblations of food were made to a 
Irving animal of this species. In India, on each day of 
the great and horrible festival of Siva, the sannyasis, 
or devotees, worship the Sun, pouring water and 
flowers on a clay image of the Alligator. \ 

Typhon mutilated Osiris. In the Indian fable, Siva 
cut off one of the heads of Brahma, the creative god, 
who, as opposed to the destroyer, bears a certain 
relation to Osiris. This coincidence has often been 
remarked. § 

Papremis the Egyptian Mars, and all other de 
structive daemons of the male sex, were considered as 

* Ward, ubi. supra. 

f Mr. H. T. Colebrooke, on the Religious Ceremonies of 
the Hindus. Asiat. Researches, vol. v. p. 363. 
+ Ward, vol. i. p. 26. 
§ Paterson. Asiat. R. vol. viii. Wilford, Asiat. R. vol. iii. 



TYPHON, AND SIVA THE DESTROYER. 277 

forms or characters of Typhon. So Kartikeya, the 
o-od of war amonff the Hindoos, and ail their maleficent 
or destructive gods, are regarded as forms of the 
destroyer Siva.* 

The frightful atrocities and astonishing self-tortures 
practised by yoguees and sannyasis, in the worship 
of Siva, form one of the most striking spectacles in 
the superstition of India. The great autumnal festival 
of Siva,+ which happens nearly at the same season 
with the lamentation for the death of Osiris, bears, in 
many points, a striking resemblance to the mournful 
rites and flagellations of the Egyptians, and perhaps 
more particularly to the corresponding ceremonies of 
the Syrian Baal, whose worshippers cut themselves 
with knives. 

Another ceremony, in honour of Siva, displays rites 
similar to the wintry festival in honour of Osiris, 
though celebrated at a different season. cc Every 
year, in the month of Phalgoona, the Hindoos made 
the image of Siva, and worship it for one day, throw- 
ing the image the next day into the water. This 
worship is performed in the night, and is accompanied 
with singing, dancing, music, feasting, &c.";j; 



3. Of the Worship of Bhavani, or Isi } compared with that of 
the Egyptian Isis. 

Most of the Egyptian goddesses resolve themselves 
into two, as we have before remarked. These are 

* Ward's Introduction. 

f For a full and authentic description of this festival, I must 
refer the reader to Mr. Ward's View of the History, &c. of the 
Hindoos, vol. i. p. 21, et seqq. 

X Ward, ubi supra. 



278 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

Isis, the consort of Osiris ; and Nepthys, or Venn*,, 
the wife of Typhon. 

In like manner the Hindoo goddesses all resolve 
themselves into various forms of Bhavani or Durga, 
the wife of Siva ; and Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu. 

But,, in Egypt, Isis is by far the most conspicuous, 
and appears in the most varied forms. So, in India, 
Bhavani, in her various characters, comprises nearly 
the whole catalogue of Hindoo goddesses. 

Her original character in the shastras is that of 
Pracriti or Bhagavati, the female power, or Nature 
personified. Such., as we have shown, was the primi- 
tive designation of Isis, or Natura multiformis; the 
universal mother, ce cujus numen unicum, multi- 
formi specie, ritu vario, nomine multijugo, tot us 
veneratur orbis." 

Pracriti is identified with Parvati, the mountain- 
born goddess. So Isis, or Demeter, in her Grecian 
name, is, as we have seen, but faintly distinguished 
from the mountain-goddess Artemis, on earth, and 
from Persephatta, or Hecate, in the infernal regions., 
who are sometimes called her daughters, at others 
are identified with herself. 

Pracriti, or Bhavani, and Isis agree accurately in 
their original sense, both being personifications of 
prolific Nature. They coincide not less remarkably, 
when the Hindoo goddess becomes the bloody Kali, 
and the Egyptian, assumes the form of the horrible 
Brimo, or Tithrambo, who is described as iC noctur- 
nis ululatibus horrenda, triformi specie larvales impe- 
tus comprimens." 

The rites of Maha Kali, or Chandi, fhe maleficent 
form of Durga, are detailed in the Kalica purana. Most 



TYPHON, AND SIVA THE DESTROYER. 279 

of the animals considered as Typhonian, among the 
Egyptians, are immolated before the shrine of Chandi. 
" The Kalica purana directs that birds, tortoises, 
alligators, fish, buffaloes, bulls, he-goats, ichneumons, 
wild boars, rhinoceroses, antelopes, guanas, rein- 
deer, lions, tygers, men, and blood drawn from the 
offerer's own body, be offered to this goddess." The 
following horrid incantation is addressed to her, when 
an offering is made to effect the destruction of an 
enemy. cc O goddess of horrid form ! O Chandika ! 
eat, drown such a one, nry enemy, O consort of fire ! 
Salutation to fire ! This is the enemy who has done 
me mischief, now personated by an animal : destroy 
him, O Maha mara ! Spheng ! Spheng ! eat, devour !"* 

Like that of the Egyptian Tithrambo, the worship 
of Kali is connected with the phases of the Moon. 
The rites of the Hindoo goddess were formerly cele- 
brated monthly, and the darkest nights in the month 
were chosen for that purpose. At present her wor- 
shippers hold a festival to her honour on the last night 
of the decrease of the Moon, in the month Kartika, 
which is called the Syama, or black festival. f We 
have observed something analogous in the Egyptian 
rites of Hecate. 

Parvati, or Isi, as well as the Egyptian goddess, 
is in some manner related to the Moon. A crescent is 
painted on her forehead, and on that of her husband 
Isa, or Siva. Isa, in one of his forms, is expressly 



* Ward on the Hindoo Mythology, vol. i. Asiatic Re- 
searches, vol. i. 
f Ward, ubi supr£, vol. i. p. 154. 



280 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

called the Moon, and his consort, Isi, is then Luna.* 
The Moon, in the Hindoo mythology, is of two 
sexes. Chandra, or Deus Lunus, is the Moon in 
opposition to the Sun; Chandri, or Dea Luna, is 
the Moon in conjunction with him. In Egypt we 
have seen that in the month Phamenoth, Osiris 
was fabled to make his entrance into the Moon, 
though at other times the Moon was regarded as the 
visible appearance of Isis. But we are not accurately 
informed of the circmustances which distinguish 
Lunus from Luna, or of the precise relations of Isis 
and Osiris respecting the Moon. It is sufficient to 
trace a similar conversion in India and in Egypt. 

In Egypt the Moon was at certain times a male- 
ficent goddess ; she wore the semblance of the angry 
Hecate. The Moon among the Hindoos is also 
regarded as a malignant planet. f 

The beneficent form of Bhavani, termed Devi, or 
Anna Puma, is doubtless, as Sir W. Jones remarked, 
the Anna Perenna of the Romans, whose religion 
bears, in some particulars, a still closer resemblance 
to the eastern system, than the Greek, and perhaps 
even than the Egyptian. Anna Purna is, however, also 
the counterpart of the Egyptian Isis. She is figured 
as bent by the weight of her full breasts, and reminds 
us of the statues of Isis, J or Ceres Multimamma. 

Bhavani is invoked by the name of Ma, as was 
Derneter, amongst the Greeks, § by that of Maia, <( and 

* Moor's Hindoo Pantheon, p. 289. 
f Ward. % Paterson. 

% Ceres, as well as Proserpine, was called Maia. Indeed 
they are expressly affirmed to be the same by Porphyry. 



BHAVANI COMPARED WITH ISIS. 281 

she is frequently represented " like the Grecian god- 
dess, or rather like the Phrygian mother, in a car 
drawn by lions, holding a drum, and wearing a 
towered-coronet on her head."* Under the name of 
Bhavani, this goddess designates the fecundity of 
nature. She is invoked, as was Isis, by women in 
childbirth. 

The same Hindoo goddess is worshipped under the 
form of Jagaddhatri, or Mother of the World. She 
is represented in that character as sitting on a lion, 
and holding in her four hands a conch, a disc, a 
club, and a water-lily. 

Her peculiar emblem, the Yoni, is as well known 
as was the Cteis, in the Eleusinian mysteries. 

The last circumstance I shall notice is the vene- 
ration of the Cow, as connected with the worship of 
Isis in Egypt, and of Bhagavati, or Bhavaui, in 
India. 

The Cow is regarded in India as a form of Bhag- 
avati/)- as, in Egypt, of Isis the beneficent. It is also 
remarkable that Nephthys, the Egyptian Venus 
Urania, was also worshipped under the form of a Cow, 
and that Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu, who corres- 
ponds with her in all the particulars that history has 
preserved, bears a similar relation to this sacred 
animal. 

The Brahmans perform a ceremony, by which they 
fancy that certain spiritual privileges are conferred. 

Maia was her appellation, as the terrestrial goddess, mother of 
Earth, the nurse of all living creatures. See Porphyrius, de 
Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 16. 

* Moor's Hindoo Pantheon. 

f Ward, vol. i. p. 123. 

o o 



282 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

This process is considered as a kind of regeneration. 
It consists in passing through the body of a golden 
Cow. It has been remarked that the story of Myce- 
rinus probably contains vestiges of the same practice 
among the old Egyptians.* 

It is not our design merely to furnish a parallel 
between these two systems, the relations of which seem 
tolerably obvious. The reader who wishes to pursue 
this subject will find much curious information in the 
works of Sir W. Jones, Mr. Paterson, Mr. Wilford, 
the Rev. Mr. Maurice, and several other well-known 
authors. 

Enough, I trust, have been said to show that the 
most celebrated and striking part of the Egyptian 
ceremonies, those for example which attracted the 
attention of the whole Pagan world, and spread 
themselves over a great part of it, including the 
pompous worship of Isis and Osiris, are nearly related, 
in the most essential circumstances, to that system 
of Indian superstitions which belongs to the depraved 
religion of Siva and his consort Bhavani. This 
system we have assigned, in our historical outline, to 
the third era, when the idolatry of the East had attained 
its utmost degree of corruption. 

* See the story of Mycerinus, who enclosed his daughter in 
the body of a golden Cow. Herodotus, lib. ii. This coinci- 
dence has been remarked by Mr. Forbes. Oriental Memoirs. 



VISHNU COMPARED WITH HORUS. 283 



SECTION III. 

Indian Fables relating to Vishnu, compared with the Egyptian 
Mythology. 

In the foregoing outline of the history of Hindoo 
Mythology, it was considered that the worship of 
Vishnu, or at least the religion of the present Vaish- 
navas,* had perhaps a still later origin, than those forms 
of superstition which we have been comparing with the 
Egyptian rites of Isis and Osiris. The fables of the 
Puranas, respecting the incarnations of Vishnu, do 
not appear to have made their way into the Egyptian 
mythology, nor do we find in Egypt any clear and 
undoubted vestiges of the superstition assigned to 
this era. 

In the character however of Horus, or Aroueris, 
the restorer of the universe, the god of light, there 
are some traits which correspond with the description 
of Vishnu, or Heri the preserver. 

" Vishnu is a personification of the Sun, or con- 
versely the Sun is a type of him : this character, as 

* I say the religion of the present Vaishnavas, or followers 
of Vishnu, who worship his incarnations, Rama, Crishna, &c. 
or, in other words, are hero- worshippers. Vishnu^ as one of 
the three manifestations of the divinity, holds his place in the 
Vedas, though he is not so conspicuous there as Brahma, the 
creative power; but the Vishnu of later times differs in many 
respects from the Vishnu of the oldest tradition. 



284 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

well as that of Time, he shares with Brahma and 
Siva. In Hindoo mythology, every thing is indeed 
the Sun. Vishnu is sometimes the earth: he is 
water, or the humid principle generally : hence he 
is air, which the Hindoos regard as a form of 
humidity/'* 

Horus likewise was the Sun under some particular 
relation : Osiris, indeed, and other Egyptian gods, 
bear a near relation to the Sun, but Horus in a more 
peculiar manner: hence the Greeks called him 
Apollo. Hermapion, in the interpretation of the 
famous inscription on the Heliopolitan Obelisk, finds 
Horus called the supreme lord and author of Time.f 
Horus, in the form of the infant Harpocrates, is seen 
sitting on a lotus flower, intimating, as we have seen, 
the germinating principle, the influence of moisture 
and solar heat. 

Garuda, the sacred eagle, is the bird of Vishnu: 
seated on him, the god soars aloft in the air. C( This 
marks/' says Mr. Moor, C( the aerial levity of hiss 
character." 

More than one species of hawk, and several other 
birds, were sacred in Egypt to Horus. The hawk, 
which soars upwards towards the Sun without appear- 
ing to be dazzled by its beams, was in a peculiar 
manner the type or sacred messenger of Horus. 

Horus, as before observed, was described in his 
turn as the Pantheus, or soul of universal Nature. 
The same conception of Vishnu is found in the 
Sri Bhagavat and other Hindoo works written by 
Vaishnavas. 

* Moor's Hindoo Pantheon, art. Vishnu, 
t Ammian. Marcellinus. 



VISHNU COMPARED WITH HORUS. 285 

Notwithstanding these points of resemblance, it 
may be doubted whether Horus can be clearly iden- 
tified with Vishnu. Horus seems to have been a very 
exact copy of Osiris. Like Osiris/ he was a Priapus : 
the fundamental idea of Horus seems to have been 
that of a restorer of the productions of Nature, of 
which Osiris was the generator. Hence his history 
forms almost a repetition of that of Osiris. The 
religion of Vishnu, according to the conjecture of M. 
Schlegel, was introduced into the Indian system from 
Persia, and was connected with the worship of the 
Persian Mithra. However this may have been, it 
does not appear that this part of the mythology was 
as yet fully developed at that remote period, when 
the Egyptian and Indian systems were connected by 
a close affinity. 

There is indeed a curious though imperfect coin- 
cidence between the Egyptian and Indian Triads. 
Osiris, Typhon, and Horus, are in some way related 
to Brahma, Siva, and Vishnu. The notion of a Triad 
of supreme powers is indeed common to most ancient 
religions ; but w hat proves that there is some particular 
connection between the Indian and Egyptian Triads, 
is the fable that the three gods of each system were 
of three different colours. In the Hindoo mythology, 
Brahma is red, Vishnu black, and Siva white.* In 
the Egyptian, as Plutarch informs us, Osiris was 
always black, Horus white, and Typhon red. The 
essential difference between the Indian and Egyptian 
Triad is the circumstance that, in the former, the 
Creator has still a place ; while in the Egyptian, 

* Paterson, Asiatic Researches. 



286 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN POLYTHEISM. 

although this mythology acknowledged a creator of 
the world, yet he had fallen from his place in the 
Triad, which was filled up entirely with merely 
sensual and physical gods, or figures of the powers of 
nature. We are obliged to search more deeply into 
the Egyptian mythology, in order to find the doctrine 
of creation, or a creator : the exterior is occupied with 
the more striking superstitions that relate to the 
objects of sense, as the popular worship was directed 
towards visible and tangible objects. 

There is one fable relating to Vishnu, which bears 
a curious resemblance to one of the most remarkable 
fictions in the Egyptian mythology. I mean the 
story of his sleeping through the four wintry-months, 
and rising in the spring ; an allegory founded on his re- 
lation to the Sun. This fiction strongly reminds us of 
the annual disappearance and resurrection of the solar 
Osiris. Vishnu sleeps from the twelfth or fifteenth of 
the moon in the month Asharha, corresponding with 
December, until the twelfth or fifteenth in Kartika, 
which corresponds with April.* The ceremonies, 
which are performed in commemoration of his sleep, 
bear some resemblance to the Egyptian customs. A 
Hindoo vows that no razor shall come on his head; 
that he will abstain from flesh, fish, salt, peas, oil, &c. 
and from eating more than once a day during this 
whole period ; and he engages to attend more minutely 
than before to his daily duties, such as bathing, and 
repeating the name of his god.f These observances 
are similar to those practised by the Egyptians, during 

* Ward, vol. ii. p. 27. 
f Ibid. p. 26. 



VISHNU COMPARED WITH HORUS. 287 

theirperiodsoffastingand purification.* TheHindoos 
observe a strict fast on the eleventh of the increase of 
the Moon, in Sravana, Bhadra, and Kartika.f On 
the former of these days, Vishnu goes to sleep : on 
the second he turns to the other side, and on the 
third he awakes. These observances may be com- 
pared with the winter-festivals, connected with the 
concealment and re-appearance of the Egyptian god, 
respecting which we have already selected ample 
details. 



SECTION IV. 

Esoteric Philosophy of the Egyptians, compared uith the 
Doctrines of the Hindoos, in the earliest period. 

The most celebrated fables of the Egyptians, and 
nearly the whole of their popular worship, are nearly 
related, as we have seen, to the rites of Siva and 
Bhavani, and other superstitions which we suppose 
to have had their origin about the same period. It is 
only in the more recondite parts of the Egyptian 
mythology, which are chiefly known to us by means of 
a few fragments preserved in the works of philo- 
sophers and metaphysical writers, that we trace any 
resemblance to the older doctrines of the Hindoos, 
respecting the creation of the world, and the emana- 
tion of subordinate beings from the essence of an 
eternal spirit. 

* These observances will be noticed in the following Book, 
f Ward, vol. ii. p. 76. 



^88 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN COSMOGONIES. 

But in those imperfect fragments of the Egyptian 
cosmogony, and of their theology, properly so called, 
which have escaped the wrecks of time, we are 
enabled to discover all the leading principles so fully 
developed in the ancient Hindoo Scriptures. 

The sum of the Egyptian doctrine, as we have 
shown above, is, that a spiritual being, without parts, 
and incomprehensible, existed from all eternity. 
From his essence, at a certain period, a finite being 
originated, who became the demiurgus, or creator, 
and from him all inferior souls emanated. Not only 
is this doctrine to be traced in the East, but all 
the circumstances connected with it, and the peculiar 
style of representation. 

1. The eternal spirit termed Cnuphis, or Cneph, 
produced the universe in its chaotic state, which is 
figured under the emblem of an egg. At the same 
time he assumed a new form, or gave origin to Phtha, 
the Egyptian Vulcan, or Artificer of the fabric : by 
whom the chaotic egg was separated into its ele- 
ments, and air and earth, and other creatures, were 
called forth. Cnuphis corresponds with the Indian 
Brahme, and Phtha with Brahma. The Hindoo 
doctrine is contained in the following verses of 

Menu's Cosmogony. 

" He whom the mind alone can perceive, impercep- 
tible to sense, invisible, who exists from eternity — 
even He, the soul of all beings, whom no being can 
comprehend, shone forth in person. 

He, having willed to produce various beings 
from his own divine substance, first with a thought 
created the waters, and placed in them a productive 
seed : 



INDIAN AND EGYPTIAN COSMOGONIES. 289 

" That seed became an egg, bright as gold, 
blazing like the luminary with a thousand beams;* 
and in that egg he was born himself in the form of 
Brahma, the great forefather of all spirits. 

fc In that Egg the great power sat inactive a whole 
year of the Creator, at the close of which, by his 
thought alone, he caused the egg to divide itself. 
And from its two divisions he framed the heaven above, 
and the earth beneath" 

The Egyptians, even in their cosmogony, could not 
resist the propensity to material and sensual analogies. 
Phtha, the framer of the world, the sole parent of all 
things, was, forsooth, of a double sex. We have 
before traced this figure in works of undoubted au- 
thority, and may now quote the Asclepian dialogue 
ascribed to Hermes, in which the god is twice called 
Masculo-feminine : ec Hie ergo," he says cc qui solus 
est omnia, utriusque sexus fcecunditate plenissirnus, 
semper voluntatis suae praegnans, parit semper quid- 
quid voluerit procreare." 

Thus the demiurgus is represented as becoming the 
parent of all kinds of beings, rather than as creating 
them. 

This fiction is found in Menu's cosmogony, and in 



* Compare this description with the Orphic fable, as it 
is displayed in the following expressions, translated above, 
in page 166. 

cn'ACwv vuJtov Ttrspvyoiv xpvcrcuv, Iikuj; dvBpiu)K£(ri Slvous. 



P P 



290 ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY COMPARED. 

various other Indian writings.* The following is a 
passage selected from the Rig-veda, in which the 
same idea is curiously expanded. 

cc The primeval being, looking round, saw nothing 
but himself " — " He felt not delight. He wished 
the existence of another, and instantly he became 
such as man and woman joined. He caused 
this, his own self to fall in twain, and thus became 
husband and wife : thence were human beings 
produced." 

" She reflected, doubtingly, ■ I will now assume a 
disguise/ She became a Cow, and the other became 
a Bull — the issue were kine. She was changed into 
a Mare, and he into a Horse : one was turned into a 
female Ass, and the other into a male One, and the 
one-hoofed kind were the offspring. " The author 
continues to enumerate their metamorphoses into 
goats and sheep, and concludes, " In this manner 
did he create every existing pair whatsoever, even to 
the ants and minutest insects. "f 

We have already shown that the Hindoos, at least 
as early as the age of the Vedas, though they 
acknowledged a Creator, confounded him with his 
works, and included the universe itself in their idea of 
the divinity. That the Egyptians were Pantheists, 
even in this sense, and identified the soul of the 
world with the eternal deity, may be seen from the 
remarks on their cosmogony, in the foregoing part 
of this work. Such is the dogma which Plutarch 

* The Tantras teach that after Brahma had entered the 
world, he divided himself into male and female. Ward. 

f Colebrooke on the Vedas, A. R. vol. viii. I have omitted 
some words in this quotation, " euphemiae gratia." 



INDIAN AND EGYPTIAN COSMOGONIES. 291 

cites from Hecataeus. <( They consider/' says this* 
writer, " the primitive god as identified with the 
universe itself." 

Notwithstanding this vague and indistinct manner 
of conception, the Hindoo scriptures contain the 
doctrine of the creation of the world in its proper 
sense; as it is probable that the Egyptian did also. 
The following hymn, from the Rig-veda, declares this 
tenet in terms which remind us of the beginning of 
Genesis. 

ce The Supreme Being alone existed ; afterwards 
there was universal darkness ; next the watery ocean, 
was produced by the diffusion of virtue : then did 
the Creator, lord of the universe, rise out of the 
ocean, and successively frame the Sun and Moon, 
which govern day and night, whence proceeds the 
revolution of years ; and after them he framed heaven 
and earth, the space between, and tbe celestial 
region /'f 

We have seen that the Egyptians, by a strange 
inconsistency, declare, in some of the parts of their 
mythology, the Sun to be the demiurgus ; and that 
they frequently identify the Sun with the Soul of 
the world. In the Rig-veda we find that <c the 
great Soul, Mahan Atma, is called the Sun, for 
he is the soul of all beings, and that it is declared by 
the sage that the Sun is the soul of what moves and of 
that which is fixed/' Other deities are portions of 
him.f 

From this soul of the universe, or primitive spirit, 

* Colebrooke, Asiatic Researches, vol. v. p 367. 

t Colebrooke on the Vedas, Asiat. Resear. vol viii. p. 397« 



292 ESOTERIC PHILOSOPHY COMPARED. 

all individual souls emanated. This dogma,, as we 
see in passages already cited, is common to the 
mythology of Egypt, and the oldest remains of the 
oriental doctrine. 

It is worthy of remark that the worship of the 
Supreme God is scarcely mentioned in the history of 
the Egyptians. We learn, indeed, from Plutarch, 
that the people of Elephantine refused to contribute 
to the support of the sacred animals, because they 
paid their adorations to no other deity than Cneph, 
the eternal spirit ; but this seems to have been a 
vestige of antiquity, and of opinions which had long 
been obsolete among the more celebrated divisions of 
the Egyptian people. Phthas, or Vulcan, the secon- 
dary god, or demiurgus, had some temples at a late 
period in Lower Egypt, but his rites were eclipsed by 
the more splendid worship of Isis and Osiris; and he 
was reckoned, in the theogonies of Manethon, as the 
oldest of the gods. In India also, Brahma, the demiur- 
gus, is the god of antiquity, and has no temples or 
appropriate worship among the modern Hindoos ; 
and Brahme, the eternal spirit, who, as we have 
seen, is Cneph under another name, is still further 
removed from the adorations of the people. 



ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF MYTHOLOGY. 293 



SECTION V. 

General Inferences respecting the Origin and History of 
Mythology. 

From the survey and comparison of all the infor- 
mation we can collect relating* to the history of 
superstition in Egypt and in the East, we are led 
to the following general reflections on the original 
state and subsequent revolutions of mythology and 
metaphysical doctrines in these departments of the 
ancient world. 

1. It appears that the priests and sages of the 
Egyptians, as well as those of India, in the earliest 
ages which fall within the reach of profane history, 
acknowledged one eternal principle as the source 
whence all other beings had originally emanated, and 
with which all or a part were destined, after intervals of 
greater or shorter duration, to become again in some 
manner re-united ; that this first principle is described 
in the oldest remains of the philosophy of both nations 
as a spiritual and incomprehensible being, endowed 
with intellect and power, to the voluntary exertion 
of which the production of all finite beings is attri- 
buted. It must therefore be allowed, that the 
mythology of these nations contains the belief in 
the existence of a Deity, in the sense in which that 
word is understood among Christians and European 
philosophers in general. 

If we are permitted to regard those principles, 
which are common to nearly all the ancient systems 



294 GENERAL INFERENCES RESPECTING 

of mythology, as the original possession of mankind, 
we must allow the doctrine above described, or a 
species of theism nearly resembling it, to have been 
among the elements of the primitive faith, or the 
first system of religion that prevailed ; for we trace 
the same, or very similar tenets, in the religious creed of 
all those nations who have possessed sufficient art and 
refinement to preserve any memorials of early times, 
To the Hindoos and the Egyptians we may add the 
Persians, the Chinese, and the Scandinavians, the 
Celtic people, or those tribes subjected to the autho- 
rity of the Druids, and several other nations. 

2. This doctrine was not merely, as some writers 
have pretended, a theory of speculative philosophy ; 
but a system of religion in the proper sense. It con- 
templated in the Deity, not merely the author of the 
universe, but a moral governor of the world, whose 
dispensations were so arranged as to reward the 
virtuous and take vengeance on the guilty. It re- 
presented the present embodied state of intelligent 
beings as a scene of purgatorial chastisement, and 
the destined means of their restoration to primitive 
innocence and happiness, or of re-union to the source 
whence they were derived. 

Indeed, a very important feature in this ancient 
system of philosophy is the conspicuous place it 
assigns to the immortality of the soul, and the firm 
and implicit faith with which this dogma was received. 
" The belief in a future state, which prevailed among 
the oriental people in the earliest times of history, 
was not, as it has been remarked, a persuasion 
founded on probable arguments, or an inference 
discovered by Jong reflection ; nor did it consist in 



THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF MYTHOLOGY. 295 

the distant glances of a bold imagination into an 
undefined world of shadows; but it was the clear 
assurance of realities so certain and impressive, that 
the contemplation of futurity formed the rule by 
which all the affairs of this life were to be governed— 
the scope towards which all the social customs and 
ordinances of civil life were to be directed, even to the 
most minute observances/'* cc The Egyptians/ 5 says 
Diodorus, ff regarded this world as a transitory scene, 
and the future state as an abode for ever; hence they 
were content to dwell in hovels,, but anxious to adorn 
their tombs with much labour and magnificence, 
regarding them as eternal mansions." 

3. While we are directing our attention to the 
earliest doctrines respecting the Deity, we must not 
omit to remark one singular circumstance which has 
attracted the notice of many theologians and investi- 
gators of antiquity. If those principles which are 
common to the oldest systems of religion are to be 
considered as elements of the primitive faith, we must 
ascribe to the theism of the first ages a triple distribu- 
tion of divine attributes, or the dogma of a triad of 
persons or manifestations of divinity. We shall not 
pretend to investigate the relation of this obscure 
tradition with that doctrine, respecting the Divine 
Nature and the modes of its subsistence, which 
distinguishes Christian theology from the simple 
theism of speculative writers. Such a disquisition 
would be foreign to our present purpose. We have 
only to mention the doctrine of a divine Triad as 
one of the common characters of the most ancient 
systems of gentile theology. 

* Schlegel, Sprache und Weisheit der Indier. 



296 GENERAL INFERENCES RESPECTING 

It cannot be expected that we should here enter 
into a long discussion respecting the origin of this 
primitive religion. If this subject were followed into 
the speculations which it might open to our view, it 
would lead us very far from the principal purpose of 
this work. We shall, therefore, dismiss it with one 
or two brief remarks. 

If the earliest religion were the production of the 
human faculties,— if it had been elaborated by the reason 
and imagination of men, we should doubtless observe 
it in the grossest and most sensual, in the rudest and 
most imperfect state, in the first periods of society : 
it would be found to assume a more refined character, 
as the human mind became more cultivated. But the 
very reverse of this is true in point of fact. The 
earliest faith was pure and simple, exhibited com- 
prehensive and exalted conceptions of the Deity, and 
contained the most awful and impressive sanctions of 
morality. In subsequent periods it appears to become 
continually more depraved and sensual. Another 
remarkable circumstance is the deep and powerful 
impression which the religion of the first ages dis- 
plays on the minds of its devotees, and its paramount 
influence over the whole national and personal charac- 
ter of the people who were submitted to its institutions. 
Nor is it less important to observe that the voice of 
all history, both sacred and profane, agrees in ascrib- 
ing this influence, and the implicit faith with which 
the dogmas of religion were received, to their super- 
natural origin, and to the circumstances under which 
they had been revealed by the Deity to the human 
race. 

The first step towards the corruption of this simple 
form of theology seems to have been the attempt to 






THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF MYTHOLOGY. 297 

adorn it with the figments of philosophy, according 
to that style of philosophizing that was suited to the 
genius of the age. It is to this period that we must 
refer most of the pagan cosmogonies. Many of them 
contain the doctrine that the world was created by 
the voluntary agency of the Supreme; but this idea 
was not enough to satisfy curiosity, and we find it 
often blended with some fanciful analogies derived 
from natural processes that are daily observed. The 
production of the organized world was compared by 
some to the germination of seeds; an idea which 
occurs in the Institutes of Menu, and in some of the 
representations of the Grecian schools. Hence also 
the celebrated fiction of the Mundane Egg, or the 
e »» produced spontaneously in the womb of Erebus, 
containing in itself the elements which were after- 
wards distributed into the various departments of the 
world. 

To the same childish fondness for analogies and 
illustrations we must attribute that description of the 
demiurgus, or creative power, which represents him as 
comprising in himself two sexes, and producing all 
subordinate creatures by the way of generation. On 
this subject enough has been said in the foregoing- 
pages. 

Another important step in the progress of supersti- 
tion, and one which seems to have led the way to the 
establishment of the first pagan worship, was the 
habit of resolving the doctrine of emanation into those 
descriptions of the deity which verge towards pan- 
theism. These two theories are so nearly allied, that 
the former naturally degenerates into the latter, while 
the pantheistic representation of the divinity involves 

Q Q 



298 GENERAL INFERENCES, ETC. 

or leads inevitably to the deification of material 
beings, and particularly of the more striking and 
conspicuous objects in the visible universe. To the 
same style of philosophy belong the personification 
of the most remarkable powers of nature, the conse- 
cration of emblems, some of them the most obscene, as 
types or symbols of those powers ; the decorated 
pomps and gorgeous superstitions of the pagan world, 
and all the prodigious abominations in which a 
corrupt religion emulated and exceeded the actual 
depravity of men. All these innovations produced 
a mist which darkened the eyes of the victims of 
superstition, and concealed from them those principles 
which were still recognized by the learned as the 
basis of their religious system. 



BOOK THE FOURTH. 

OF THE EXOTERIC OR POPULAR WORSHIP OF 
THE EGYPTIANS, AND OF THE VARIOUS CIVIL 
INSTITUTIONS EMANATING FROM THEIR 
RELIGION. 



CHAPTER 1. 

OF THE WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 

SECTION I. 

Introductory Remarks. 

There was no single feature in the character and 
customs of the ancient Egyptians which appeared to 
foreigners so strange and portentous as the religious 
worship paid to animals. The pompous processions 
and grotesque ceremonies of this celebrated people 
excited the admiration of all spectators, and that 
admiration was turned into ridicule on beholding the 
object of their devotions. It was remarked by Clemens 
and Origen,* that those who visited Egypt approached 
with delight its sacred groves and splendid temples, 
adorned with superb vestibules and lofty porticos, the 
scenes of many solemn and mysterious rites. cc The 
walls/' says Clemens, " shine with gold and silver, 
and with amber, and sparkle with the various gems of 
India and ^Ethiopia ; and the recesses are concealed 
by splendid curtains. But if you enter the penetralia, 
and inquire for the image of the god, for whose sake 
the fane was built, one of the Pastophori, or some 
other attendant on the temple, approaches with a so- 
lemn and mysterious aspect, and, putting aside the 
veil, suffers you to peep in and obtain a glimpse of the 

* Clemens. Peedag. lib.iii. Origen. adv. Celsum. lib. iii. 
p. 121. 



302 EXOTERIC OR POPULAR RELIGION. 

divinity. There you behold a snake, a crocodile, or 
a cat, or some other beast, a fitter inhabitant of a 
cavern or a bog than of a temple." A similar remark 
was made by Lucian ; and Juvenal, in his fifteenth 
satire, derides the folly of the Egyptians, whose 
priests in his time had degenerated into a tribe of 
jugglers. 

" Quis nescit, Volusi Bithynice, qualia demens 
iEgyptus portenta colat ? Crocodilon adorat 
Pars haec, ilia pavet saturam serpentibus Ibim. 

******** 

Porrum et coepe nefas violare et frangere morsu. 
O sanctas gentes, quibus hsec nascuntur in hortis 
Numina !" 

It is in the rites of animal worship that the exoteric or 
popular character of the Egyptian superstition most 
clearly developes itself. It is in these rites that we 
are enabled to discern the practical tendency of this 
ancient species of paganism, and to estimate the 
moral effects it was calculated to produce upon the 
people devoted to its influence. This is not less im- 
portant, if we wish to understand the true character 
of the mythology, than the analysis of philosophical 
enigmas, in which the vulgar were in no way in- 
terested, and to the true sense of which they were not 
admitted. We shall therefore proceed, in the following 
pages, to assemble the most remarkable facts which 
the ancient writers have handed down to us, with 
reference to this subject. 



WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 305 

SECTION II. 

Of the Veneration paid to Animah in general. 

The devotion with which their sacred animals were 
regarded by the Egyptians, displayed itself in the most 
whimsical absurdities. It was a capital crime to kill 
any of them voluntarily ;* but if an Ibis or a Hawk 
were accidentally destroyed, the unfortunate author of 
the deed was put to death by the multitude, without 
form of law. In order to avoid suspicion of such an 
impious act, and the speedy fate which often ensued, a 
man, who chanced to meet with the carcase of such a 
bird, began immediately to wail and lament with the 
utmost vociferation, and to protest that he found it 
already dead.f When a house happened to be set 
on fire, the chief alarm of the Egyptians arose from 
the propensity of the cats, which Herodotus calls " a 
divine instinct/' to rush into the flames over the heads 
or between the legs of the spectators : if this catas- 
trophe took place, it excited a general lamentation. 
At the death of a cat, every inmate of the house cut 
off his eye-brows ; but at the funeral of a dog, he 
shaved his head and whole body.J The carcases of 
all the cats were salted, and carried to Bubastos to be 
interred ;§ and it is said that many Egyptians arriving 
from warlike expeditions to foreign countries, were 
known to bring with them dead cats and hawks, which 
they had met with accidentally, and had salted and 

* Herodotus, ii. c. 65. Diod. lib. i. p. 74. 

f Diod. lib. i. p. 75. J Herod, lib. ii. e. 66. 

§ Herodotus, c. 67. 



304 EXOTERIC OR POPULAR RELIGION. 

prepared for sepulture, with much pious grief and 
lamentation.* In the extremity of famine, when they 
were driven by hunger to devour each other, the 
Egyptians were never accused of touching the sacred 
animals. 

Every nome in Egypt paid a particular worship to 
the animal that was consecrated to its tutelar god ; 
but there were certain species which the whole nation 
held in great reverence. These were, the ox, the 
dog, and the cat; the hawk and the ibis; and the 
fishes termed oxyrhynchus and lepidotus.f 

In each nome the whole species of animals, to the 
worship of which it was dedicated, was held in great 
respect ; but one favoured individual was selected to 
receive the adoration of the multitude, and supply the 
place of an image of the god. Perhaps this is not far 
from the sense in which Strabo distinguishes the 
sacred from the divine animals. Thus, in the nome of 
Arsinoe, where crocodiles were sacred, one individual 
of this species was kept in the temple and worshipped 
as a god. He was tamed, and watched with great 
care by the priests, who called him (C Souchos," and 
he ate meat and cakes which were offered to him by 
strangers. \ In the same neighbourhood there was a 
pond appropriated to the feeding of crocodiles, with 
which it was filled, the Arsinoites carefully abstaining 
from hurting any of them. Sacred bulls were kept 
in several towns and villages, and nothing was spared 
that seemed to contribute to the enjoyment of these 
horned gods which were pampered in the utmost 
luxury. 

* Diod. lib.i. c. 6. 
f Strabon. Geograpb. lib. xvii. J Ibid. 



WORSHIP OF QUADRUPEDS. 305 



SECTION III. 

Of the IVorskip of Quadrupeds. 
1. Of Oxen. 

Of all animals, the ox kind received in Egypt the 
highest honours. No individual of this species was 
ever slaughtered merely for the sake of food. Bulls 
were occasionally killed in sacrifice, but cows were 
exempted even from that peril.* They were sacred 
to Isis ; and so impious and polluted were all those who 
ate the flesh of the cow, that no Egyptian man or 
woman would use the knife or pot of a Greek, or 
approach his person. When a cow died, they com- 
mitted her carcase to the sacred river ; but they buried 
bulls in the suburbs, with one or both horns above 
ground for a mark ; and when a stated time had 
elapsed, during which the flesh was thought to have 
rotted away, a vessel was sent from the island of 
Prosopitis in the Delta, with people whose office it 
was to dig up the bones and carry them to an appointed 
place, where they were all buried. f 

Such was the respect paid throughout Egypt to the 
whole kind ; but there were individuals of this species 
that claimed a singular veneration. The bulls Apis 
and Mnevis were the highest in this rank: the former 
was kept in a temple at Memphis, and the latter at 
Heliopolis ; and, according to Diodorus, they were 

* Herodotus, lib. ii. c. 41. f Ibid. 

R R 



306 WORSHIP OF QUADRUPEDS. 

both sacred to Osiris. Strabo says,, they were not 
sacred, but divine. 

Apis was a black bull, but had a white star on his 
forehead,, the figure of an eagle on his back, and, 
according to Pliny, a crescent on his right side,* with 
a knot under his tongue, resembling the Scarabaeus 
or sacred beetle. f But iElian declares, that the body 
of Apis was decorated with twenty-nine sacred marks, 
to each of which, the Egyptians assigned some 
mystical import, not easy, as this author says, to be 
understood by profane persons. One of these was 
a symbol of the increase of the Nile; another was a 
microcosm or representation of the world; a third 
contained a mystic allusion to that darkness which 
existed before light was brought forth. J 

Apis was the offspring of the celestial elements. 
His mother was supposed io be impregnated by a 
flash of lightning, or, according to Plutarch, by the 
light of the Moon.§ He lived twenty-five years, which 
is well known to have been the duration of a celebrated 
cycle in the Egyptian method of chronology ; and at 
the end of this period he was reported to destroy 
himself by jumping into a well, or, as some said, into 
the Nile. To this catastrophe Statius alludes. |j 

" Say, in what meads the godlike Apis deigns 
To browze before the crowd of suppliant swains, 
Till, headlong mid the sacred waters hurl'd, 
Sated with life, he quits the grieving world?" 

* Plinii Hist. Nat. lib. viii. + Herod, lib. iii. c. 28. 

J jElian de Animal, lib. ii. c. 10. § Plut. de Isid. 

|| Statii Sylvarum, lib. ii. carm. ii. v. 115. Jablonski, Panth. 
./Egypt, lib. iv. cap. 2, p. 199. ' 



OF OXEN : RITES OF APIS. 30? 

The discovery of a new Apis gave rise to a joyfnl 
festival, which was called Theophania, or the ma- 
nifestation of the god ; it continued seven days. 
iElian, a diligent collector of these stories of super- 
stition, which he seems to be sometimes in doubt 
whether to laugh at, or to regard with wonder and 
veneration, has given us the following account of the 
proceedings which took place on the discovery of a 
new Apis.* 

" As soon as a report has been spread abroad that 
the Egyptian god has been brought to light, certain! 
sacred scribes, who are well versed in the mystical 
marks, which they have learnt by tradition, approach 
the spot where the divine Cow has deposited her calf, 
and there, following the ancient prescript of Hermes, 
feed it during four months with milk, in a house which 
fronts the rising sun. After this period of infancy, if 
it may be so called, has passed, the sacred scribes and 
prophets resort to the dwelling of Apis, at the time of 
the new moon, and, placing him in a vessel prepared 
for the purpose, convey him to Memphis, where he has 
a convenient and delightful abode, with pleasure- 
grounds and ample space for salubrious exercise. 
Companions are provided for him, the females of his 
own species. He drinks out of a well or fountain of 
clear water ; for it is not judged expedient to admit 
him to the water of the Nile, which is considered as 
too fattening. It would be too long to relate," con- 
tinues iElian, "what pompous processions and sacred 
ceremonies the Egyptians perform when they cele- 
brate the rising of the Nile, or the Theophania, in 

* jElian, loc. citat. 



308 WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 

honour of this god'; or what dances, and festivities, 
and joyful assemblies, are appointed on this occasion, 
in the town and in the country. The man from 
whose flock the divine beast has sprung is the 
happiest of mortals, and is looked upon with admi- 
ration by all the people. This Apis/' continues 
iElian, ce is an excellent interpreter of futurity. He 
does not employ a woman sitting upon a tripod, 
like some other gods, or require that a priestess shall 
be intoxicated with the sacred potion ; but inspires 
boys, who play around his stable, with the divine 
impulse, which enables them to pour out predictions 
in good rhythm." 

Apis, after his tragic fate before related, was 
honoured with a pompous funeral in the temple of 
Serapis, at Memphis ; and the priests followed him 
to his tomb, in a procession, with ceremonies which, 
according to Plutarch, resembled the rites of Bacchus 
among the Greeks.* 

cc Next to the Memphite Apis, the highest honours 
were paid to the sacred Bull of Heliopolis, called 
Mnevis."f This bull, which was dedicated to Osiris, 
was of the same colour as that god, viz. black. "J 
Respecting Apis, there is some difference of opinion 
among the ancients ; some writers affirming that he 
was dedicated to the Moon ; though the more accu- 
rate writers, as Diodorus and Strabo, declare, on the 
contrary, that Apis and Osiris were the same ; but 
it is agreed, on all hands, that Mnevis belonged to 

* Plut. de Isid. cap. 33. 
f See Strabo, lib. xvii. ^Elian. lib. xi. cap. 11. 
% Plut. de Isid. cap. 



OF OXEN I MNEVIS AND OTHER BULLS. 309 

Osiris, or to the Sun. Strabo says that he was kept in 
a stable, which seems to have been in the temple of 
the Sun, and that he was worshipped as a god by the 
Heliopolitans, as Apis was by the Memphites. 

Among the sacred bulls of inferior note, Strabo 
mentions one which was kept at Hermonthis.* And 
Macrobius informs us that this animal was called 
Pacis ; f that it was consecrated to the Sun in a 
magnificent temple of Apollo, and distinguished by 
its colour, which was said to change every hour, and 
by the direction of its hair which was reversed. 

iElian mentions a sacred bull, worshipped under the 
name of Onuphis. J He says it was of huge bulk, and 
had its hair reversed ; a characteristic assigned also 
to Mnevis.§ 

Respecting the sacred cows of the Egyptians, we 
have nothing to add to the observations given already, 
in reference to the rites of Isis and the worship of 
Nephthys. We now proceed to 



2. The Worship of Dogs. || 

The dog, as we have seen, was sacred to Anubis, 
and was chiefly worshipped atCynopolis, or the city of 
dogs; but as the rites of Anubis were every where 
connected with those in honour of Isis, the dog* 
received veneration throughout Egypt: and dogs 

* Strabo, lib. xvii. f Macrob. Saturn, lib. i. cap. 21. 

X -Elian, lib. xii. cap. 11. 

§ Porphyr, apud Euseb. Praep. Evangel, lib. iii. cap. 13. 
|| Sacred Dogs were kept in the temple of Vulcan, in Sicily. 
/Elian, lib. xii. cap. 3. 



310 WORSHIP OF QUADRUPEDS. 

accompanied the celebrated Pompa Tsiaca, or the 
procession in honour of the horned goddess. 

Many ridiculous reasons are assigned for the 
reverence paid to the dog kind. ^Elian has given us 
a collection of them. Some said that it arose from 
the idea that young dogs ere blind for thirteen days 
after they are whelped, and the Moon is dark thirteen 
days in the year. Others connected the worship of 
the dog with the important station of the dog-star 
in the Egyptian calendar.* 



3. Of the Worship of Cats. 

Cats were chiefly worshipped at Bubastos. We 
have already mentioned the anxiety manifested by 
the Egyptians to procure for dead cats, wherever they 
found them, the rites of sepulture. 

The Egyptians discovered something peculiarly 
venerable in dogs and cats, as we learn from the 
epithets applied to them. 

Per tua sistra precor, per Anubidis ora verenda. 
And 

Sancta Bubastis — <e The holy Bubastis." 

Such was the epithet of the cat-goddess. f 

Plutarch says there is a wonderful sympathy 
between the pupil of the cat's eye, and the increase 
and waning of the Moon ; and a mysterious relation 

* iElian de Animal, lib. x. cap. 45. 
f Ovid, Amor. lib. ii. eleg. 13. Metam. lib. ix. v. 687- 



THE CAT, THE WOLF, AND THE RAM. 311 

between the number of young a cat bears at one 
litter, and the number of the lunar days ; and by these 
analogies, we are told that the Egyptians accounted 
for the strange veneration in which this animal was 
held among them.* 

Horapollo says, the statue of the Sun at Heliopo- 
lis, was in the figure of a cat ; but he is the only 
author who makes this assertion. The cat is by all 
other writers assigned exclusively to Bubastis and 
the Moon.f 



4. Worship of the Wolf. 

The wolf was worshipped at Lycopolis, as the 
name of that city imports. 

We learn from ^lian, that the wolf was sacred to 
Apollo, that is, to Horns. The reason of this conse- 
cration is, because Apollo was born of Latona, or, as 
the Egyptians said, nursed by her in the form of a 
wolf. For this reason also, a statue of a wolf stood 
in the temple of Apollo, at Delphi. \ 



5. Worship of the Ram, 

The ram was held sacred at Thebes, in Upper 
Egypt, and at Sais, in the Delta. § " Those who 
worship in the temple of the Theban Jupiter/' says 
Herodotus, " abstain from sheep, and sacrifice goats. || 

* Plut. de Isid. f Horap. Hierog. lib. i. cap. 10. 

X JElmn, lib. x. cap. 26. § Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 559. 

II Herod, ii. 42. 



312 WORSHIP OF QUADRUPEDS. 

They assigned, as a reason for this custom, a story, 
the purport of which is unintelligible, that Jupiter, or 
Amnion, disguised himself in a sheep-skin when he 
appeared to Hercules. The Thebans never killed a 
ram, except at the annual festival of Ammon, when 
they clothed the statue of the god with the skin. 
This statue had the human form, with the head of a 
ram.* 

cc In the Nitriotic nome," says Strabo, " Serapis is 
worshipped, and here only sheep are sacrificed by 
the Egyptians." 



6. Of the JVorship of the Goat. 

The worship of the Mendesian goat was one of the 
most singular parts of the Egyptian superstition. 
These rites were as abominable as the adoration of 
cats and dogs was ridiculous. 

The male-goat was worshipped, as we have seen, 
as an image of the same power which the Greeks 
personified with the title of Priapus. One he-goat 
represented the god Pan, and was kept in the temple 
of Mendes, but all the species was sacred through 
the nome. 

Strabo gives us, in a few words, an idea of the rites 
of Mendes. iTg hi Yiivhapog (prjfriu, hi rpquyoi evroivQa. 
yvvuit;) [xiyuDurar. The passage of Pindar, to which 
the geographer refers, is the following: — 

Miv%7}Ta, wapa xprjfjivov §oLha(T(Tr\g 

Ns/Aou xepag, auyiSoLroi 

'OSi rpayoi yuuoii^) pta'yovTou.'f 

* Herod, loc. cit. f Apud Strabon. lib.xvii. p. 551. 



OF THE "WORSHIP OF THE GOAT. 313 

This detestable custom was therefore as ancient as 
Pindar, who lived five centuries before the Christian 
era, and probably it was much more ancient. 

Herodotus confirms this account, but he mentions 
it as a rare and portentous occurrence. Plutarch 
makes a curious remark upon this subject. c O 
Mevh^cnog iv Kiy(i7mo rpayog, T^eysrai zsoKhoug xou xoikoug 
G~vveipyv6[JL£Vog yitvai^i, ouh eluou [AiyvuG'da.i T&poQufAog, 
aXXa zzpog rag ouyag ststotitoli jaaXAov. On which 
Bochart properly remarks, " Nempe sola in brutis 
Natura saepe plus potest quarn in homine ratio." 

Tantum Relligio potuit suadere malorum ! 



7. Of the Worship of the Deer. 

At Coptos, where Isis was adored with a great 
exhibition of attachment and devout grief, the 
Egyptians consecrated to her wild deers, and wor- 
shipped them. The same people held it no crime to 
kill and eat the male of the same species. f 



8. Of the Worship of Monkeys and Apes. 

. It appears that two animals of the monkey-tribe 
were worshipped in Egypt, for Strabo informs 
us that the Babylonians adored a Cepus, and the 
Hermopolitans a Cynocephalus. Cynocephalus has 

* These authorities are cited by Bochart. Hierozoic. lib. 
ii. p. 642 ; and from him by Jablonski. 
t iEliarij Jib. x f cap. 23. 

s s 



314 WORSHIP OF MONKEYS. 

been supposed to be the name of an image of 
Anubis,* with the head of a dog, joined to the 
body of a man ; but this is evidently a mistake. 
Both the Cynocephalus and the Cepus are described 
by iElian,f and by Aristotle. Aristotle, after men- 
tioning both these animals, remarks that the Cepus 
has a tail. J Hence it would appear that the Cynoce- 
phalus must have been an ape. 

Horapollo says that the Cynocephalus was sacred 
to Hermes, because one tribe of these animals was 
supposed to understand the use of letters, and that 
when a new monkey was introduced into the temple, 
to supply the place of his predecessor, the priests 
tried whether he was competent to the dignity con- 
ferred upon him, by placing a writing-tablet, with a 
pen and ink before him.§ 

We know nothing further respecting the worship 
of these animals. Perhaps the Hermopolitans conse- 
crated an ape to Hermes on account of its sagacity. 



9. Of the Ichneumon. 
The ichneumon was worshipped at Heracleopolis, |j 

* Minut. Felix. Octavio, cap. 21. Tertullian, Apolog. cap. 
vi. These writers call Anubis, Cynocephalus. It would seem 
that Plutarch also called Anubis, Cynocephalus \ Isis et Osiris^ 
cap. 73. 

f /Elian, de Animal, lib. x. cap. 30. lib. xvii. cap. 8. 

% Aristot. Hist. Animal, lib. ii. cap. 8. 

§ Horap. i. cap. 14. 

|| Strabo, lib. xvii. iElian, lib. x. cap. 47. 



OF THE SHREW-MOUSE, LION, AND RIVER-HORSE. 315 

where it probably represented Hercules. iElian says 
it was sacred to Latona and Lucina, that is to Buto 
and Bubastis. 



10. Of the Shreiv-Mouse. 

The shrew-mouse, or mygale,* was a goddess of no 
small importance in Egypt, since, under this form 
Latona or Buto was worshipped. The Greeks assign 
the imagined blindness of this animal as the reason 
for dedicating it to the goddess of night, or darkness. 
The shrew-mouse was worshipped in the Athribitic 
nome.f 



11. Of the Lion. 

The lion was worshipped at Leontopolis ■ but we 
have no particular account of the rites paid to it.J 



12. Of the Hippopotamos. 

The hippopotamos was sacred to Papremis, or 
Mars, and was worshipped in the Papremitic nome, 
but in no other part of Egypt. Papremis appears to 
have been a form of Typhon. Accordingly the hippo- 
potamos was one of the animals called Typhonian.§ 

The ass was another Typhonian animal, || but it 

* Sorex Araneus, or shrew-mouse. Linn. Syst. Nat. 
t Strabo. 

X Strabo, lib. xvii. Porphyr. lib. iv. cap. 9. De Abstinentia. 
§ See the foregoing section on Papremis. || Plut. de Iside. 



316 TYPHONIAN ANIMALS. IMPURE ANIMALS. 

does not appear to have received worship in any 
part of Egypt. At Coptos it was the custom, on 
certain occasions to throw an ass down a precipice, 
in order to express detestation of Typhon.* 



13. Of Impure Anim a Is. 

The Oryx was considered by the Egyptians as 
impure, for a reason as ridiculous as any part of 
these mystical absurdities — cc or) arawT pot.<f>eig -crpog t^v 
avaroATjv, ttjv tou Ha/ou, ra zsspirroL rijg iaurou rpo<pijg 
bcS%i€si wg fyatriv 61 'Aiyu7rrioi — quia ad orientem 
solem conversus alvum dejicit.f Other equally 
strange notions were entertained respecting the oryx ; 
as that he turned to the East and gave notice of the 
rising of the dog-star by sneezing^ as if he scented it 
in the air: that he uttered a sound at the time when 
the moon rises like a voice of execration. § 

The hog, according to iElian, was an impure 
animal, because he does not abstain from eating his 
own offspring. || Herodotus says that swine were 
held so impure, that a person who had been acciden- 
tally touched by an animal of that kind immediately 
went to wash himself, with his clothes, in a river. H 
Swineherds were refused admittance into the Egyp- 
tian temples, and formed a distinct caste, with whom 
other persons refused to intermarry. Yet at the full 

* jElian, de Animal, lib. x. cap. 28. See also Horapollo, 
lib. i. cap. 49. 

f Plinii. Hist. Nat. lib. ii. cap. 40. 

% Plut. in lib. utra anim. § ^Elian, lib x. cap. 16. 

|| Herod, lib. ii. cap. 47- % Plutarch de Isid. cap. 30. 



IMPURE ANIMALS. BIRDS. 317 

moon, the Egyptians were accustomed to sacrifice 
swine to that planet, and to eat the flesh. 

The Greek mythologists preserve some traces of 
the consecration of other animals, which we do not 
discover in the Egyptian theocracy, though it is 
probable that they once had places in it. The bitch 
was the sacred animal of Hecate, as well as the 
lioness, the bull, and the horse; the she-wolf, of 
Diana ; and a lion and a dragon, of the Sun.* All 
these are probably the traces of Egyptian stories 
which are lost. 



SECTION IV 

Of the Worship of Birds. f 
1. Of the Hawk. 

iC The Egyptians," says iElian, Ci reverence the 
hawk, as sacred to Apollo, whom they name, in their 
language Horus." " These birds are termed Thausti." 
" The priests of Horus are called Hieracobosci, or 
Hawk-feeders, since it is their office to take care of 
the sacred hawks. The whole species is consecrated 

* Porphyry, de Abstinentia. lib. vi. 

f Vestiges of the worship of birds are very numerous in the 
Grecian mythology. See the birds of Aristophanes, where 
all these traces are assembled, and placed in the most ridicu- 
lous point of view. See also iElian de Animalibus, lib. xii. 
cap. 40. 

J iEHan, Hist. Anim. lib. x. cap. 14. 



318 SACRED BIRDS. THE HAWK. 

to this god ; but there are some particular birds which 
they feed with great care in the sacred groves, as 
dedicated in a peculiar manner to Apollo. "* 

Horus was one of the gods worshipped by the 
whole Egyptian nation, and the hawk was every where 
sacred, but received a particular worship at Apollino- 
polis.f It was from this circumstance that Apollino- 
polis is called, by Strabo, the city of Hawks. J The 
temple of Horus contained a statue of that god, with 
the head of a hawk. 

The reason assigned for dedicating the hawk to 
Horus is the bold flight which this bird is observed 
to make towards the Sun, without appearing to be 
dazzled by its rays.§ It appears from Horapollo, 
that the figure of a hawk was a common emblem of 
the Sun, in the hieroglyphic paintings and sculptures 
of the Egyptians. The life of this bird, according 
to a notion commonly prevailing among that peo- 
ple, extended to seven hundred years. Various 
fabulous attributes were ascribed to the hawk, as the 
motives for paying him divine honours. 

The species of hawk which was the object of 
this idolatrous veneration appears to have been the 
Falco Communis of Linnaeus. H In the island of 
Philae, on the confines of ^Ethiopia, another species 
of the same genus was consecrated, which, according 
to Strabo, was brought from the interior of Africa, 
and differed essentially from the Egyptian hawk.** 

* iElian, Hist. Anim. lib. vii. cap. 9. 

t Euseb. Praep. Evangel, lib. Hi. cap. 12. 

J Strabo, Geogr. lib. xvii. § iElian, loc. citat. 

II Horapoll. Hieroglyph, lib. i. cap. 8. 

% M. Savigny, Description de l'Egypte. 

** Strabo, Geograph. lib. xvii. 



THE CROW,, VULTURE, EAGLE, IBIS. 319 

The hawk was not only emblematical of Horus, 
but of Osiris also. It is certain, at least, that the 
statues, and sculptured figures of this god, are com- 
monly distinguished by the head of a hawk. 



2. Of the Crow. 

The crow, also, was sacred to Apollo, or Horus. 
In the neighbourhood of Coptos, only two individual 
birds of this species were to be seen, which belonged 
to the temple of Apollo.* 



3. Of the Vulture. 

In the city of Eilithyia, or Lucina, vultures were 
sacred, and the image of the goddess was in the form 
of a vulture. f 



4. Of the Eagle. 

The eagle was sacred in the Theban nome, and 
in the temples of Jupiter Ammon.J 



5. Of the Ibis. 

The ibis is one of the most celebrated of the sacred 
animals of Egypt, and it was second to none in the 

* iElian. lib. vii. cap. 18. 

f Euseb. Praep. Evang. lib. iii. cap. 12. 

J Strabonj Geograph. lib. xvii. 



320 SACRED BIRDS. THE IBIS. 

estimation of the people, if we may judge by the 
innumerable mummies of this bird which have been 
discovered. 

The ibis, as we have mentioned before, was sacred 
to Thoth, or Mercury : it was venerated throughout 
all Egypt. 

Many absurd reasons are assigned for its consecra- 
tion, as its increasing and waning with the Moon ; and 
the gratitude which the Egyptians felt towards it for 
delivering their country from serpents, and for having 
taught them the use of glysters, which this bird, 
according to Plutarch and iElian, is in the habit of 
administering to itself.* The most probable account 
of this matter seems, as we have before observed, to 
be derived from the hieroglyphic writing. 

The ibis was one of those animals which received 
honours in every part of Egypt, but the chief seat of 
its worship was at Hermopolis.J It appears from an 
observation of Apion, that a bird of this species was 
kept in the temple of Hermes, in that city, as a 
particular representative of the god, which the 
priests exhibited to strangers, protesting that it was 
immortal. § 

The stork, and the owl, were also sacred birds, || but 
we have no particular information respecting this 
part of the Egyptian superstition. 

* iElian, lib. ii. cap. 35, 38. Plutarch, de Iside et Osis. 
f Artabanus, apud Euseb. Pr»p. Evang. lib. ix. cap. 37. 
% JEUrb, de Animal, lib. x. cap. 29. 
§ Ibid. lib. x. cap. 16. 



WORSHIP OF BIRDS. 319 

6. Of the Goose, 

I have not met with any observation in the ancient 
writers respecting the worship of the goose ; but it 
appears from sculptures in the temples of Upper 
Egypt, that this bird was a member of the theocracy. 
It is represented, at least, as receiving food from 
persons who approach in the posture of supplicants.* 
Yet the goose was commonly killed as a victim to the 
gods, for no animal is more frequently seen in the 
sculptured representations of sacrifices. f 

The goose was offered as a victim to Isis and 
Osiris, if we may attach confidence to an obvious 
inference from the words of Ovid and Juvenal. 

Ovid says,J 

u Nee defensa juvant Capitolia, quominus anser 
Det jecur in lances, Inachi lauta, tuas." 

And Juvenal, 

" Ansere magno 

Scilicet et tenui popano corruptus Osiris. "§ 

Perhaps the custom of swearing by a goose, which 
prevailed among the people of Crete, had its origin in 
the veneration paid by the Egyptians to this bird. 
It is said that Rhadamanthus forbade the Cretans to 
swear by the Olympian gods, and ordained an oath 
by a goose, a dog, or a ram. We find in the Greek 
writers many vestiges of this practice. || 

* See the fourteenth Plate, third tome of the (c Description 
de l'Egypte," in which a kneeling figure is seen in the act of 
presenting food to a goose. 

f See Montfaucon, Antiquity Explique'e. 

i Ovid. Fasti, lib. i. v. 453. § Juvenal, Sat. vi. v. 540. 

|| Platonis Dialog, item Aristophanes, pluribus locis. 

T T 



320 WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 



SECTION V. 

Of fabulous Birds, which are traced in the Egyptian 
Mythology. 

Scarcely any imaginary being has been the theme 
of more numerous fables and conjectures than the 
Phcenix> It was much celebrated among the Egyp- 
tians,, from whose mythology this fiction has descended 
to the poetry of modern times. 

The important place which the Phoenix held in the 
religious fables of Egypt appears from the frequent 
recurrence of its figure in the sculptures of the 
temples in the Thebaid. In most of these wonderful 
edifices it is seen many times repeated.* 

The fathers of the Christian church have consi- 
dered the Phcenix as an emblem of the resurrection 
of the dead and the future life. As these ideas 
are not foreign to the doctrines of the Egyptian 
philosophers, it is possible that they may have been 
associated in some manner with this symbol ; but the 
chief and primary allusion of the Phcenix seems, as 
far as we can learn, to have been of a different 
description. This bird, according to Horapollof and 
other writers, was a type of the Sun, and of the great 

* " Description des Antiquites d* Edfou, par E. Jomard/' 
ill the " Description de Y Egypte." 
f Horapoll. Hieroglyph. 



OP FABULOUS BIRDS. 321 

solar year of the old Egyptians .* The duration of 
its life is variously denned; but it seems generally 
agreed that the period of its age bore a reference to 
some astronomical cycle. According to Herodotus, it 
lived 500 years; but many authors double this period, 
as Nonnus, 

<Pohi{; repfjia. Gioto &ipcoy. 

But Tacitus, probably with more accuracy, defines 
the age of the Phoenix to be 1461 years, which is the 
duration of the great year of the Egyptians ; at the 
end of which the apocatastasis took place, when all 
the planets were supposed to return to one point 
in the heavens. f 

The young Phoenix made its appeararce at Helio- 
polis, and deposited the body of its father in the 
temple of the Sun. Others say that the old bird 
came to Egypt and there died upon a funeral-pile, 
and that the new Phoenix sprang from its ashes. I 
shall cite Claudian's description, because it contains 
most of the circumstances related of this bird. 

€i O felix hseresque tui. Que solvimur omnes, 
Hoc tibi suppeditat vires. Prasbetur origo 
Per cinerem. Moritur te non pereunte senectus. 
Vidisti quodcunque fuit. Te ssecula teste 
Cuncta revolvuntur. Nosti quo tempore pontus 
Fuderit elatas scopulis stagnantibus undas-; 

* Cum hujus vita anni magni fieri conversionem rata fides 
est apud auctores. Solin. Polyhist. cap. 36. 

f See Salmasius in Solinum. This writer lias cited the 
authorities of Manethon, Dion, Firmicus, and Censoiinus. 



322 FABULOUS BIRDS. 

Quis Phaethonteis erroribus arserit annus ; 
Et clades te nulla rapit, solusque superstes 
Edomita tellure manes. Non stamina Parcae 
In te clara legunt, non jus habuere nocendi." 

Hesiod is the oldest Greek writer who mentions the 
Phoenix ; but the fable is very ancient, for it seems 
unquestionable that it is alluded to in the book of 
Job.* 

* Job, chap. xxix. v. 18 ; which ought to be rendered, 
ei Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my 
days as the Phoenix." The Septuagint rendered the Hebrew- 
word by $o<yj£, which may mean either a palm-tree, or the fabu- 
lous bird called Phoenix ; and the sense of the passage proves 
that we ought to understand the latter. Bede was the first 
author who rightly apprehended the sense of this passage. 
He says, "Palma autem arbor secundum Graecos $otvi$Z dicitur. 
Avis quoque ilia quam multi facile quidam vivere autumant 
3>ow£, eodem nihilominus vocabulo nuncupatur. Potuit 
fortassis de eadem hoc loco dixisse, ut sicut ilia nidum sibi 
faciens, in ipso post multa tempora a semetipsa concremari, 
et rursus de ejusdem nidi cineribus fertur intra breve tempus 
resurgere, quae deinceps multis vivat temporibus ; fieri ergo 
potest, at B. Job in similitudinem avis illius dicat, se post 
mortem in carnis cinere, velut in nido pro tempore futurum 
et inde resurrecturum in glpriam ; atque hos eeternos esse 
dies quos multiplicandos sibi fidelis Dei cultor expectet. Ita 
enim et superius locutus est, dicens, c Et rursum circumdabor 
pella mea et in came mea videbo Deum.' " 

It is remarkable that Sir W. Drummond should have pro- 
posed this interpretation of the passage in Job, as a new 
criticism of his own. Probably he had overlooked the passage 
of Bede above quoted. Yet the whole paragraph is given by 
Bochart at length in his Hierozoicon, p. 819. 

The same ambiguity in the meaning of the word $ow£ has 
also, led the poet Ezechiel into a ridiculous blunder, which has 



WORSHIP OF REPTILES. 323 

SECTION VI. 

Of the Worship of Reptiles, Insects, Fishes, and Plants, 

1. The Crocodile. 

There were three provinces in Egypt where the 
crocodile was worshipped, viz. the nomes Coptos., of 
Arsinoe, and Ornbos. The people of Ombos dug 
tanks for them, fed thenv, and taught them to come 
when called. The reason assigned by the Ombites 
for this reverence of the crocodile was derived from 
the Egyptian doctrine of mystical numbers; they 

not escaped the notice of Bochart. It is mentioned in Exodus, 
c. xv. v. 27) that the Hebrews, in their journey through the 
desert, found Palm-trees at Elim. Ezechiel mistakes the 
meaning of the Greek word, and accordingly introduces a 
messenger informing Moses that he has seen the Phoenix in 
that place. 

s'fspov <5s tfpbs Toig hSofj.ev Zouov %£vov 
6aufj.oc$ov, ohv sU itco ujpotxs n$. 
ditfXouv yap yv ?b |U/>j>co£ ahtov <r^(e^QV t 

Tt'tEpQlVl TtOlKlXOlClV 1J#£ %pu)[j,a,<riv. 

See Euseb. Prsep. Evang. lib. ix. 

All the passages in ancient authors referring to the Phoenix 
may be seen collected in Bochart's Hierozoicon, p. 819, &c. 
In Sir W. Drummond's Essay in Classical Journ. vol. xiv. In 
Lareher's Memoire sur la Pe iode Caniculaire, &c. Mem. de 
T Institut Royal. See also Dornedden's Phamenophes oder 
Versuch einer neuen theorie tiber den ursprung der kunst und 
mythologie. 



324 WORSHKP OF REPTILES. 

fancied that this animal lives sixty years, goes sixty 
days pregnant, lays sixty eggs, has sixty teeth, and as 
many vertebrae. The worshippers of this creature 
were so infatuated, that mothers rejoiced when their 
children were devoured by crocodiles, believing that 
great honour was conferred upon them by the god 
who condescended to feed upon their offspring.* 

The crocodile was sacred to Typhon, who was said 
to have assumed this form.f It was destroyed by the 
people of Tentyra, and the other districts of Egypt, 
and violent feuds arose between the votaries and the 
enemies of this animal. The Apollinopolites, who used 
to hang crocodiles up in their trees, and eat them after 
beating them to death, were regarded with peculiar 
detestation by their neighbours of Ombos. 



2. Serpents* 

The Egyptians, according to Phylarchus, regarded 
the asp with peculiar veneration, and rendered these 
venomous animals so tame that they would feed from 
the hands of children, and come from their hiding- 
places when summoned by a noise made with the 
fingers. J 

^Elian relates a story which exemplifies the influ- 
ence of this strange superstition upon the deluded 
wretches addicted to it. Ci A labourer, employed in 
digging a trench in a vineyard, accidentally cut an 
asp in pieces by a blow of his spade. The man was 

* -^lian, lib. x. cap. 21, cap. 24. f Ibid. 

% Apud iElian, de Hist. Animal, lib. xvii. cap. 5. 






WORSHIP OF THE CROCODILE. 325 

so terrified by the horrible impiety he supposed him- 
self to have committed, that he became frantic, and 
ran about imploring succour, fancying himself pursued 
by the angry reptile-god. He at length obtained a 
cure, on resorting to the temple of Sarapis, the Egyp- 
tian iEsculapius."* 

The Egyptians reckoned sixteen species of asps, 
one of which was sacred to Thermuthis. Accord- 
ingly, the statue of Isis was crowned with a coiled 
serpent, instead of a diadem. f The asp was supposed 
to be commissioned by the goddess, as a minister of 
her vengeance, to destroy impious men. In each 
corner of every Egyptian temple, there was a subter- 
ranean chamber devoted to Thermuthis, where the 
priests deposited the fat. of oxen for the entertain- 
ment of the asps. 

Another species of serpent, which was termed a 
dragon, was fed as a sacred animal in the Egyptian 
Melite. It was kept in a tower, and the priests placed 
cakes every day in its chamber, which it speedily 
devoured. iElian relates that a man, who had com- 
mitted a trifling offence against the majesty of this 
god, was so horror-struck that he became frantic, and 
suddenly dropped down and expired. } 

A species of serpent called Parias, or Paruas, which 
is innoxious, was dedicated to ^£sculapius.§ Aristo- 
phanes, in the Plutus, has given us a humorous 
description of the office which this animal held in the 



* jElian, lib. xi. cap. 32. f Ibid. lib. x. cap. 31. 

X Ibid. lib. xi. cap. 17. Compare this account with that 
©f Bel and the Dragon, in the Apocrypha. 
§ Ibid. lib. viii. cap. 12. 



326 WORSHIP OF REPTILES. 

ministry of the god. It performed the same office in 
the temple of Sarapis, in Egypt. 

In somnis venit 
Jubet me cepam esse et sesaminum.* 

I do not find the frog enumerated by any ancient 
author, among the sacred animals of Egypt. Yet we 
observe it represented in the Isiac table, and in several 
other pieces of Egyptian sculpture. It is seen sitting 
on the lotus, in another relic, in the collection of 
Montfaucon. 



3. Of the Worship of Insects. 

The Cantharus, Scarabseus, or Beetle, was very 
celebrated among the Egyptian sacred animals. 
Plutarch says it was an emblem of the Sun ; but 
Horapollo is more particular, and informs us that 
there were three species of sacred beetles, one of 
which was dedicated to the god of Heliopolis, or the 
Sun ; another was sacred to the Moon, and a third to 
Hermes, or Thoth. The reasons he assigns for the 
consecration of this insect are derived from the 
notions entertained respecting its mode of repro- 
duction, and its habits, in which the Egyptians 
traced analogies to the movements of the heavenly 
bodies. It was believed that all these animals were 
of the male sex. The beetle was said to fecundate 
a round ball of earth, which it formed for the 
purpose. In this they saw a type of the Sun, in the 

* Varro apud Nonium in voce Cepe. Vide Jablonski, 
lib. v. cap. 6. 



OF THE WORSHIP OF FISHES. S2T 

office of demiurgus, or as forming and fecundating the 
lower world.* 



4. Of sacred Fishes. f 

Several fishes were consecrated by the Egyptians. 
We have mentioned before from Strabo, that the 
oxyrhynchus and lepidotus were held in reverence 
by all the Egyptians. When fishing in the Nile, they 
were very careful never to destroy an oxyrhynchus. 
It was supposed that this fish sprang originally from 
the wounds of Osiris. 

The nome of Oxyrhynchus was the chief seat of this 
whimsical superstition. The Oxyrhynchites, in the 
time of Plutarch, were so enraged with the Cyno- 
polites, who had offended them by eating the sacred 
fish, that in revenge they seized upon all the dogs 
that came in their way, and offered them up as 
victims : this occasioned a civil war between the two 
nomes, in which both parties suffered great evils, and 
were at length severely punished by the Romans.^; 

The people of Syene held sacred the fish called 
Phagri, and those of Elephantine another species, 

* SeeHorapoll. Hieroglyph, lib. i. cap. 10. Plut. delside, 
cap. 74. and Porphyr. de Abstinentia. lib. iv. Euseb. Praep. 
Evang. lib. iii. cap. 4, These authors agree in the explanation 
above mentioned. 

f Several examples of this superstition are to be found 
among the Greeks. Mullets were sacred to the Eleusinian 
goddesses, and initiated persons abstained from them. See 
^Elian, lib. ix. cap. 51 5 65. See also book xii. cap. 1. 

X Plut, de Iside, cap. 72. 

u u 



328 WORSHIP OF PLANTS. 

termed Maeotse. These fishes were considered as 
prophetic messengers of the annual approach of the 
inundation. 



5. Of Sacred Plants. 

Among the plants that were regarded as mystical 
or sacred by the Egyptians, none was more celebrated 
than the lotus, under which name are included the 
nymphaea lotus* and the nymphaea nelumbo. Both 
these plants are frequently seen sculptured in the 
temples of the Thebaid. 

In the nymphaea nelumbo, which throws its flowers 
above the surface of the water, the Egyptians found 
an allusion to the Sun rising from the bosom of the 
ocean ; and it is on the blossom of this plant that the 
infant Harpocrates is represented as reposing. The 
fruit of the nymphaea nelumbo is the cyamus, or 
Egyptian bean, so celebrated by Herodotus. It is 
remarkable that this plant is no longer found in 
Egypt. In India it is indigenous, and it is often 
seen among the sacred sculptures of the Brahmans.f 

The peach-tree was also sacred to Harpocrates : to 
him the first fruits of lentils and other plants were 
offered, in the month IVIesori.j; 

* The Nymphaea lotus is the lotus of Herodotus and 
Theophrastus. Illustrations of the Lotus of Antiquity, by R. 
Duppa, L L. B. 

f Observations sur le Lotus du Nil. par. M. A. Delile^ 
Annales du Mus£e d'Histoire Naturelle, torn. i. 

J Plutarch de Iside et Osiride, cap. 68. 



OF SACRED PLANTS. 329 

It is well known that the Egyptians worshipped the 
onion. Plutarch refers this superstition to a fancied 
relation between this plant and the Moon. Leeks 
also, and various legumina, were held in similar 
veneration.* 

The acacia and the heliotrope are said to have 
been among the number of those plants that were 
consecrated to the Sun.f 

The laurel was regarded as the most noble of all 
plants.J 

There was a temple, according to Hellanicus, in 
the town of Pisidium, near the Nile, where certain 
ceremonies were performed indicating a superstitious 
adoration of the acanthus. § 

We learn from Clemens, that there were thirty-six 
plants dedicated to the thirty-six decans, or genii, 
who presided over their portions of the twelve signs 
of the Zodiac.il 



6, Of Sacred Stones. 

It appears that in certain inanimate objects the 
Egyptians fancied that they perceived relations to the 
attributes of their gods. Damascius^[ mentions solar 



* See Minutius Felix. Octav. p. 278. 

t See Kircher's CEdipus, torn. iii. eap. 2, where that learned 
but fanciful writer has given a disquisition on plants, adopted 
in the hieroglyphic system. 

X Porphyr. de Abstinentia. 

§ Hellanicus, apud Athenaeum, lib. xv. p. f>79, 680. 

|| Clemens Alexand. f Plinii Hist. Nat. lib. 37* 



330 OF SACRED STONES. 

and lunar stones ; and Pliny* speaks of the selenites, 
which imitates the phases of the Moon. 

These fancied analogies, and the mystical powers 
that were supposed to result from them, appear to 
have given origin, at a later period, to the doctrine 
of talismans, so celebrated among the Arabs, and 
afterwards among the Europeans.f 



SECTION VII. 

On the Motives which led the Egyptians to the Worship of 
Animals and Plants. 

The origin of animal worship, and the reasons or 
motives which induced the Egyptians to represent 
their gods under such strange forms, or to pay divine 
honours to irrational brutes, and even to the meanest 
objects in nature, is an inquiry which has puzzled the 
learned in various times. Herodotus pretended to be 
in possession of more information on this subject than 
he chose to make public. It has been conjectured 
that he was desirous of concealing his ignorance under 
a cloak of mystery. The later Greek writers seem to 
have been more intent on offering excuses for the 
follies of the Egyptians than on unfolding the real 
principles of their mythology ; and we find various 
and contradictory opinions maintained with equal 

* Apud Phol. cod. 242. 

f Vide Kircher. CEdip. loc.cit. item Dupuia, Origine de tous 
les Cultes. torn. iii. 






EXPLANATION OF ANIMAL WORSHIP. 331 

confidence. It appears,, indeed, that the Egyptian 
priests themselves, in the time of the Ptolemies, and 
at the era of the Roman conquest, were by no means 
agreed on this subject. 

One of the most obvious and specious attempts to 
explain this superstition is the conjecture of Plutarch 
and Diodorus ; who suppose that the Egyptians were 
induced to pay divine honours to animals out of 
gratitude for the benefits which they derived from 
them ; to the cow and the sheep, for the clothing and 
sustenance they afford ; to the dog, for his care in 
protecting their houses against thieves ; to the ibis, 
for delivering their country from serpents; and to the 
ichneumon, for destroying the eggs of the crocodile.* 

This conjecture is refuted by the well-known fact, 
that a variety of animals, which are of no apparent 
utility, and even several species which are noxious 
and destructive, and the natural enemies of mankind, 
received their appropriate honours, and were regarded 
with as much reverence as the moie obviously useful 
members of the animal creation. The shrew-mouse, 
the pike, the beetle, the crow, the hawk, the eagle, 
the hippopotamos, can claim no particular regard for 
the benefits they are known to confer on the human 
race ; still less can the crocodile, the lion, the wolf, or 
the venemous asp, urge any such pretension. Yet 
we have seen that all these creatures, and others of a 
similar description, were worshipped by the Egyp- 
tians with the most profound devotion ; that mothers 
rejoiced when their children were devoured by croco- 
diles. We may further observe that some of those 

* Diodor. lib. i. Plut. de Isid. et Osir. 



332 DIFFEREFT ATTEMPTS TO EXPLAIN 

animals which afford us food and raiment, and are, 
on that account, among the most serviceable, were 
rendered of little or no utility to the Egyptians on 
account of this very superstition. They accounted it 
unlawful to kill oxen for the sake of food, and not only 
abstained from slaughtering the sheep, but likewise, 
under a variety of circumstances, from wearing any 
garment made of its wool,* which was regarded as 
impure, and defiling the body that was clothed with it. 

These considerations seem to prove that the 
adoration of animals among the Egyptians was not 
founded on the advantages which mankind derive 
from them. 

Another attempt at explaining this mystery, which 
receives greater countenance from the general cha- 
racter of the Egyptian manners and superstition, 
is the conjecture of Lucian. This writer pretends 
that the sacred animals were only types or emblems of 
the asterisms or of those imaginary figures or groups 
into which the ancients had, in a very early age, distri- 
buted the stars; distinguishing them by the names of 
living creatures and other terrestrial objects. Accord- 
ing to Lucian the worshippers of the bull Apis adored 
a living image of the celestial Taurus ; and Anubis 
represented the Dog-star or the constellation ofSirius.f 

This hypothesis has received more attention than 
any other among modern writers. Dupuis has made it 
the basis of a very ingenious attempt to explain the 
mythologue of Isis and Osiris, and several other 
fables of antiquity, which this author resolves into 

* Plut. de Isid. cap. iv. f Lucian de Astrolog. p. 386. 



THE WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 333 

astronomical figments, or figurative accounts of cer- 
tain changes in the positions of the heavenly bodies.* 
The hypothesis of Lucian will not endure the test 
of a rigid scrutiny. For if we examine the constella- 
tions of the most ancient spheres, we find but few 
coincidences between the zodia or celestial images, 
and that extensive catalogue of brute creatures which 
were adored as divinities on the banks of the Nile. 
Where, for example, shall we discover the ibis, the 
cat, the hippopotamus, or the crocodile ? Besides,, 
if we could trace the whole series of deified brutes in 
the heavens, it would still remain doubtful whether 
the Egyptian animals were consecrated subsequently 
to the formation of the sphere, as types or images 
of the constellations ; or the stars distributed into 
groups, and these groups named with reference to 
the quadrupeds, birds, and fishes, that were already 
regarded as sacred. There are, indeed, many cir- 
cumstances which might render the latter alternative 
the most probable. But the relations between the 
animals of the sphere and those of the Egyptian 
temples are by far too limited to warrant any such 
speculation ; and Lucian is an author who is by no 
means deserving of much credit on a subject of this 
nature. 

It has been conjectured by others, that certain 
attributes of the Deity were thought to be expressed 
by the qualities of various animals, which were vene- 
rated accordingly as emblems or representatives of 
these attributes ; that the strength or physical power 

* Dupuis, Origine de tous les Cultes^ torn. ii. lib. 3,, 
chap. 2. 



334 DIFFERENT ATTEMPTS TO EXPLAIN 

of the gods was adored in the lion, and their pene- 
trating sight in the hawk. Thus the worship of 
animals is regarded in connection with the hierogly- 
phical or symbolical writing which is supposed to 
represent the most mysterious ideas under visible and 
tangible forms, by associations or allusions more or 
less striking.* 

This account of the matter is probably not without 
some foundation in truth; but it is obviously inade- 
quate to solve the whole mystery. The explanations 
adduced on this principle are laboured and contradic- 
tory to each other, and the allusions very remote. 
The qualities ascribed to animals by iElian, Hora- 
pollo, and other writers, who have handed down the 
stories which the Egyptians assigned as the motives 
for consecrating them, are almost wholly fictitious and 
absurd. They are evidently fables invented for the 
purpose of excusing and explaining superstitious 
practices, which the priests were obliged to defend. 
Besides, the sacred animals were regarded by the 
Egyptians, as we have already shown, and shall see 
more clearly proved in some passages which will 
presently be cited, not merely as types or images of 
some invisible power, but as partaking themselves of 
divinity. 

The true explanation of the singular notions and 
absurd practices we have been surveying, seems 
to be more deeply rooted in the principles of the 



* See Plut. de Iside. cap. 72 et seq. Dupuis, Origine de 
tous les Cultes, torn. 3, a la fin. Phamenophes oder Versuch 
einer neuen theorie liber den ursprung der kunst und mytho- 
logie. Von C. F. Dornedden. Gottingen. 1797. 






THE WORSHIP OF ANIMALS. 335 

Egyptian mythology. Perhaps it will receive some 
elucidation in the following passage from the works 
of Porphyry; who was more profoundly versed than 
any other writer in the mysteries of the ancient 
paganism.* 

cc The Egyptian priests/' says Porphyry, " having 
profited by their diligent study of philosophy, and 
their intimate acquaintance with the nature of the 
gods, have learnt that the divinity permeates not 
human beings only : that man is not the only creature 
on the earth possessed of soul, but that nearly the 
same spiritual essence pervades ail the tribes of living 
creatures. On this account, in fashioning images of 
the gods,, they have adopted the forms of all animals, 
and have sometimes joined the human figure with 
those of beasts; at others, have combined the shapes 
of men and of birds; for some of these images have 
the form of a man up to the neck, with the face of a 
bird, or a lion, or some other creature. Others, 
again, have the head of a man, with the remainder 
of the body, either the upper or lower parts, shaped 
like some other animal." cc On this account, also, the 
lion is adored by them as a god ; and there is a part of 
Egypt which is called the Leontopolite nome; another 
is called the Busirite, and a third the Cynopolitan ; 
for they adore, under these semblances, the universal 
power which the gods have severally displayed in 
the various forms of living nature/' 

From this passage, though somewhat obscurely 
expressed, it appears to have been Porphyry's design 

f Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 9 ; item Euseb. 
Praep. Evang. lib. iii. cap. 4. 

x * 



SS6 WORSHIP OF ANIMALS DERIVED 

to inform us that the worship of animals was inti- 
mately connected with the doctrine of emanation, 
which we have traced among the fundamental prin- 
ciples of the Egyptian philosophy. We have seen 
that all the operations of nature were ascribed by the 
Egyptians to certain daemons or spiritual beings, who 
were supposed to animate different portions of the 
universe. All these were emanations from the uni- 
versal deity or soul of the world. This doctrine was 
extended still further ; and it was imagined, that the 
soul, or vital principle, in every living being is an 
emanation from the same source ; that it is a divided 
portion of the divine nature, and derived, either 
primarily or secondarily, from the fountain of divinity. 
Accordingly, in men and animals, and even in plants, 
they adored the indwelling portions of the same 
essence. 

In another passage of the same work Porphyry 
connects the worship of animals with the doctrine of 
the soul. cc One circumstance/' says he, "which 
induced the Egyptians to regard these creatures with 
veneration, was the belief that the soul of each ani- 
mal, when separated, contains a rational principle, 
and is endowed with prescience, or the knowledge of 
futurity, and with all the powers which the human 
soul possesses in its unfettered state."* 

Precisely similar is the conclusion to which Plu- 
tarch conducts us, after discussing various opinions 
respecting the origin of animal worship. <c On the 
whole/ 5 he says, " we must approve the sentiments of 
those who do not worship these objects themselves, 

* Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 10. 



FROM THE DOCTRINE OF EMANATION. 33T 

but adore the divinity through their intervention, 
regarding them as the most lively and natural 
mirrors wherein to behold the divine perfections, 
and as the instruments or workmanship of the deity, 
who arranges the whole universe ; for we must con- 
ceive, that whatever enjoys life is more dignified 
than what is inanimate,, and beings endowed with 
perception than those which are insensible, and even 
than all the gold and precious stones in the world ; 
for the divinity does not reside in the colours, or 
forms, or beauty of surface. " cc But all those beings 
which are animated, and see, and have in themselves 
the principle of self-motion, and the perception of 
what is congruous to their nature, and what is foreign 
to it — all these have imbibed an emanation and an 
appropriate particle from that universal mind which, 
as Heraclitus truly says, governs all things ; so that at 
least the divinity is not less strikingly represented in 
these than in images of brass or stone/' which are 
alike susceptible of corruption and decay, and 
by their nature, devoid of all perception and under- 
standing.* 

The same doctrine is alluded to in another piece of 
mythology, which we owe to Plutarch ; who, not 
perceiving the relation it bore to other parts of the 
Egyptian philosophy, attempts to explain it away into 
allegory. " There are many/' he says, " who affirm 
that the animals before mentioned/' alluding to the 
Typhonian animals, " contain portions of the soul of 
Typhon, which has been separated and distributed 
among them."f 

* Plut. de Isid. cap. 77- t lb"*, cap. 73. 



338 ANIMAL WORSHIP FROM THE DOCTRINE OF 

These testimonies seem to be sufficient to authorise 
the inference, that the worship of animals among the 
Egyptians had its origin in the doctrine of emanation. 
Certain effluxes or eradiations from the essence of the 
gods were believed to be embodied in all living crea- 
tures, and it was to these indwelling portions of the 
divinity that the people addressed their adorations. 
Being possessed with this idea, they were led to look 
out foi' symptoms of the mystical indwelling power 
in the outward qualities of animals ; and hence the 
absurd stories of which we have given some examples, 
so current among the ancient priests. Every instinct 
was regarded as a mysterious allusion to some fable 
in the mythology. It was natural that noxious crea- 
tures should be regarded as manifestations of the 
destructive power, and those which are most friendly 
and serviceable to man, of the productive or benefi- 
cent. Still, the gratitude of men, for the services 
rendered them by the latter, was not, as we have 
shown, the first principle which led to the deification 
of animals. 

Nearly related to this doctrine was another piece 
of mythology, of which we have many vestiges among 
the ancient writers. The Egyptians, as we have 
before observed, believed that the souls which had 
emanated from the primitive source transmigrated 
through various bodies; nor was this change of 
forms confined to emanations of a lower or secondary 
order. As the souls of men transmigrated through 
different shapes, so the higher orders of spiritual agents 
could, as occasion required, assume any form they 
chose ; and sometimes the gods appeared in the world 
under the disguise of bulls, lions, eagles, or other 
creatures of the like description. 



EMANATION. EGYPTIAN AVATARS. 339 

Thus Diodorus informs as that the five gods of the 
elements, viz. Amnion, Minerva, (who, with this 
author, is the goddess of the upper hemisphere,) 
Vulcan, Demeter, and Oceanus, were wont to travel 
through the world, and present themselves to men, 
sometimes in the shapes of the sacred animals,, at 
others in the human form. This fiction, he adds, 
was related by a poet, who had travelled in Egypt, 
and received it from the priests. 

" The gods, like strangers from a distant shore, 
Take various shapes, and every town explore \ 
And all the wiles of secret mischief scan, 
And mark the generous deeds of man to man."* 

Perhaps this fable may have given rise to the 
distinction of divine from the herd of sacred animals. 
Those which were merely sacred contained only more 
minute effluxes from the deity ; but the divine appear 
to have been regarded as incarnations of the celestial 
gods.f 

* Diodor. lib. i. cap. 1. 

f Jablonski maintains that all these stories of the incarna- 
tions of gods in the shapes of animals were fables invented by 
the Greeks at a later age. He considers them as foreign to 
the character of the Egyptian philosophy. It would appear 
that Jablonski was unwilling to impute to his favourite nation 
so gross a superstition. Yet the doctrines of emanation and 
metempsychosis, and these fabulous transformations, are so 
evidently connected, that the Egyptians seem to have a better 
claim to the origin of this fiction than the Greeks. It is very 
probable that the early Greeks derived the story of Io, and 
all their other metamorphoses, from the Egyptians. However 
this may have been, we have so many positive and unobjec- 
tionable testimonies that such fables were current among the 



340 APPEARANCES OF THE GODS 

Various stories were related of particular avatars, 
or incarnations of this description ; some of which 
we shall collect, as they are important for the illustra- 
tion of the Egyption superstition. 

It was reported that Osiris, wishing to assist Horus 
in his war against Typhon, assumed the form of a 
wolf, and in that shape ascended from the shades. 
On this story, according to Diodorus, was founded 
the worship of the wolf at Lycopolis.* 

The Ornbites and Arsinoites, as Plutarch and 
iElian inform us, when questioned why they wor- 
shipped crocodiles, replied that it was because 
Typhon assumed that form when he attempted to 
escape the pursuit of Horus. f 

Diana or Bubastis was worshipped at the city of 
the same name under the form of a cat; and the 
reason assigned for this superstition was, according to 
Stephanus, a prevalent story that the goddess had 
assumed the shape of that animal in order to elude 
the vigilance of Typhon. J 

This malevolent being was indeed so powerful and 
so crafty that all the gods of better tempers were very 
much afraid of him. On one occasion he made so 
violent an assault upon them, that they all took flight, 
and suddenly changed their shapes into those of 

vulgar in Egypt, as well as among the priests, that we cannot 
refuse to admit them as properly belonging to the Egyptian 
mythology. Nothing, indeed, has been adduced that tends 
to invalidate this conclusion. See, however, Jablonski, Panth. 
^Egypt. lib. v. cap. 2. 

* Diod. lib. i. cap. 6. 

f Plut. de Isid. cap. JEAhn de Animal, lib. x. can. 

28 et 21, I Steph. Byzant. voce BwZaurm.. 






IN THE SHAPES OP ANIMALS. 341 

various animals. This story is related circumstantially 
by Apollodorus and Hyginus.* The latter affirms 
that he received it from the Egyptian priests. Lucian 
says it was a prevalent fable among the crowd of 
scribes and shorn prophets upon the banks of the 
Nile.f Ovid thought it a fit story for his Metamor- 
phoses. He has blended it with the Grecian fable 
of Typhceus. 

She sings from Earth's dark womb how Typhon rose, 

And struck with deadly fear his heavenly foes , 

How the gods fled to Egypt's slimy soil, 

And hid their heads beneath the banks of Nile ; 

How Typhon, from the conquered skies, pursued 

Their routed godships to the seven-mouth'd flood. 

Forced every god, his fury to escape, 

Some form of beast to assume, or earthly shape. 

Jove, so she sung, was changed into a ram ; 

From whence the horns of Libyan Ammon came. 

Bacchus a goat ; Apollo was a crow ; 

Phoebe a cat ; the wife of Jove a cow 

Of snowy hue ; Cyllenian Mercury 

A winged Ibis J 

Diodorus speaks of a similar transformation which 
the gods underwent in order to escape the persecu- 
tions of wicked men. But perhaps this is only 
another copy of the same story. § 

The god of the river Nile, who was Osiris himself 
in a particular character or function, assumed on 
another occasion the form of a bull. In this shape he 

* Apollodorus in Biblioth. lib. i. cap. 6. Hyginus, fab. 152» 

t Lucian de Sacrifices, circa fin. 

X Ovid. Met. lib. v. Maynwaring's translation. 

§ Diod. lib. i. cap. 6. 



342 EGYPTIAN AVATARS. 

paid his addresses to the daughter of the founder of 
Memphis, and became the father of /Egyptus. The 
city of Memphis was named after this princess, and 
this incarnation was, perhaps, connected with the 
worship of the Memphite Bull.* 

In the Greek mythology we find many fables of 
river gods assuming the form of a bull ; and this 
renders it very probable, that the rites of Apis or the 
bull of Memphis were derived from the fiction above- 
mentioned. Jablonski has observed that the image 
of Apis was connected with the Nilometer, and that 
the festival of the Theophania, or appearance of the 
divine Bull, perhaps related to the increase of the 
Nile.f Strabo, as we mentioned before, asserts, that 
Apis and Osiris were the same god; and the Nile 
was identified with Osiris, or was considered as an 
emanation from him. On the whole, it appears pro- 
bable that Apis was an incarnation of the Nilotic 
Osiris,, or tutelar genius of the Nile. 

Apis, it is evident, was worshipped,, not as a symbol 
merely, but as an incarnation of some daemon or 
spiritual being ; for when one bull died, and another 
was substituted, the people fancied that they still 
adored the same being, who had undergone a new 
transmigration. We are told by Plutarch, that the 
Egyptian priests declared Apis to be an image of the 

* Diod. lib. i. cap, 4. 

f Jablonski makes no allusion to the story of the tauriform 
incarnation of the Nile, which appears to be the foundation of 
these rites ; but from the fact that the image of a bull was 
connected with the Nilometer, and from the season at which 
the Theophania was celebrated, he concludes that Apis was a 
symbol of the Nile. — See Panth. ^Egypt. lib. iv, cap. 2. 






EGYPTIAN AVATARS. 343 

soul of Osiris,* and Diodorus says, that when the 
people were questioned respecting their reason for 
paying divine honours to this animal, they replied, 
" that the soul of Osiris had migrated into a bull, 
and that when a new Apis was born, the soul of his 
predecessor was immediately infused into him."f 

In like manner the worship of Isis in the form of a 
cow was connected with a story of her assuming that 
shape ; and this fable was the foundation of the Gre- 
cian fiction of Io, the daughter of Inachus, who was 
transmuted into a heifer. Isis, in the celebrated 
procession which was annually made to her honour, 
was represented with the horns of her favourite 
animal : and she is thus magnificently described by 
Ovid.J 

(C Cum medio noctis spatio sub imagine somni 
Inachis ante torum, pompd comitata suorum, 
Aut stetit, aut visa est. Inerant lunariafronti 
Cornua, cum spiels nitido flaventibus auro, 
El regale decus ; cum qua latrator Anubis, 
Sanctaque Bubastis, variisque coloribus Apis ; 
Quique premit vocem, digitoque silentia suadet ; 
Sistraque erant, nunquamque satis quaesitus Osiris, 
Plenaque somniferi serpens peregrina veneni." 



Of the Worship of Plants and Stones. 

We find very little information concerning the 
motives which induced the Egyptians to worship 
plants; but it is easy to perceive that this practice 

* De Isid. cap. 29. f Diodor. lib. i. cap. 6. 

X Ovid. Metamorph. lib. ix. v. 685. 

Y Y 



344 MOTIVES FOR CONSECRATING PLANTS. 

arose from the same principles as the adoration of 
animals. The life of plants, as well as that of 
animals, was an emanation from the gods ; and plants 
received transmigrating souls. 

We find more distinct traces of this superstition 
among the Pythagoreans and the Jewish Rabbins; 
both of which sects are known to have derived it from 
the Egyptians. Empedocles professed to have under- 
gone transmigration through shrubs, and said, that of 
all plants he preferred to transmigrate into the form 
of a laurel.* The Rabbins taught that, for certain 
sins, (C a soul goes into the leaf of a tree. Then," 
they continue, " the wind rises, and shakes it about, 
causing great torment. But this punishment ceases 
when the leaf falls to the ground. At other times, 
such a soul passes from leaf to leaf. 

From the same source the Rabbins derived the 
doctrine that souls pass into stones.f The vene- 



* iElian, Hist. Animal, lib. xii. cap. 7« Diog. Laert. lib. 
viii. Vit. Empedoclis. 

f " Rabbi Isaac Lurja went on a time into the city of Tibe- 
rias, and, passing by the great school of Rabbi Jochanan, who 
was then living, he showed his disciples a stone in the wall, 
and said to them, ' Into that stone has entered a soul, that 
cries to me to pray for her.' " Emek Hammeleck. — Traditions 
of the Jews } with the Expositions of the Rabbins. Translated 
from the German. London. 1732. 

The ideas of the Jewish Rabbins, respecting the transmigra- 
tion, agree in other respects with those which the Egyptians 
are said to have held. Transmigration was regarded in most 
cases as the chastizement of sins ; and the soul was supposed 
to pass into the body of some animal, whose propensities bore 
some analogy, real or fancied, to its vicious habits. The souls 



OF THE WORSHIP OF MEN. 345 

ration paid to inanimate objects among the Egyptians 
may, on this principle, be accounted for, and con- 
nected with the leading tenets of their superstition. 






SECTION VIII. 

Of the Worship of Men. 

As the inferior animals were supposed to be en- 
dowed with souls which were emanations from the 
essence of the gods, and accordingly received divine 
honours from the Egyptians, it would be strange if we 
found the human species alone excluded from these 
high privileges. The fact is otherwise ; we learn 
that a share of divinity was ascribed to men, and that 
they were adored on the same principle as the brute 
animals. 

We are assured by Porphyry and Eusebius, that 
there was a district in Egypt where divine honours 
were paid to a living man. Victims were immolated 
before him, and burnt upon an altar. After this 
ceremony was concluded, the divinity was allowed to 
come down and eat a hearty meal of the sacred 
viands. The name of the town or village where 
these rites were performed, was Anabis, or Anamis.* 

of proud and impudent men, according to Rabbi Isaac Lurja, 
passed into wild beasts, or unclean fowls. Tax-gatherers and 
rapacious men became ravenous birds. Souls of impure per- 
sons transmigrated into camels or storks. — Traditions of the 
Jews, vol. i. 

* Porphyr. de Abstinentia. lib. iv. cap. 9. Theodoret. c. 



346 IDEAS WHICH GAVE ORIGIN 

It is well known that the Egyptian priests, the pro- 
phets and sacred scribes, pretended in very early times 
to possess supernatural powers, and to have an insight 
into futurity. These wonderful endowments were 
attributed, not, as among the Greeks, to the temporary 
impulse of the daemon who forced his convulsed or 
intoxicated priestess to pour forth involuntary rhap- 
sodies, but to some natural superiority. We learn 
from Manethon* that those persons who displayed 
extraordinary wisdom were believed literally to par- 
take of the divine nature : the soul of the priest was 
supposed to be an emanation from that particular 
god to whose service he was especially devoted. Such 
persons seem to have been regarded as incarnations 
of the gods, not inferior in dignity, though of a 
different class from the divine animals. 

It is thus that among the ancient kings of Egypt we 
find many who bore the names of the celestial gods. 
There was a king Horus, who, according to Manethon, 
was so highly favoured by the gods as to be admitted 
to the honour of beholding them in person. A king 
of Memphis was named Tosorthrus, which is inter- 
preted iEsculapius. We know that the Egyptian 
iEsculapius was Serapis, who, as we have shown in 
the first book, was worshipped, before the practice 
of deifying men was introduced. It appears that 



Grsecos. iii. Euseb. Praep. Ev. lib. iii. cap. 4. Item cap. xii. 
Minutius Felix gives a further account. See Minut. Felix. 
Octavius, p. 281, who says he was consulted as an oracle. 

* See Manethon's account of Amenophis the prophet, in 
Josephus's Letter to Apion. 



TO THE WORSHIP OF MEN. 347 

Tosorthrus was a sacerdotal king, who received a 
title that properly belonged to Sarapis,* or iEscula- 
pius, from his devotion to this deity, and his skill in 
the art of healing-. Many of the names of the 
Diospolitan kings, in the series of Eratosthenes, are 
titles or epithets of gods. Sometimes the name of 
the god is given to the priest or king unchanged ; at 
others it is modified by some prefix, indicating a near 
relation to the deity ; as in the examples of Athothes, 
which is interpreted Hermogenes, or the son of 
Thoth ; Pente-Athyris, which means the high- 
priest of Athyri ; Pentephres, or, as the name is 
corruptly written, Potiphar, the high priest of the 
Sun. In some instances it would appear that a name 
thus modified, and the precise appellation of the god, 
were applied indifferently to the same individual. 

This practice accounts for the magnificent titles 
given by the later Egyptians, to their kings of the 
Macedonian race. In the inscriptions found in Egypt, 
belonging to the Ptolemaic period, these monarchs 
are called " gods," and the most exalted titles are 
lavished upon them.f The Roman Caesars seem 
afterwards to have emulated the Ptolemies in the 
degree of adulation they exacted. 

It is on this principle that we must explain many 
fictions and singular expressions relating to the 
Egyptian gods, which have induced some modern 
writers to suppose, that the original objects of 



* Jablonski conjectures that Tosorthros is a corruption of 
Tuse-tho, which means in the Coptic, " Healer of the world.'* 

f The Rosetta inscription contains several titles of this 
class. 



348 IDEAS WHICH GAVE ORIGIN 

worship among this people were mortals deified. 
Particular gods were said to have founded cities, 
invented sciences, and enacted laws : these actions 
can only have been done by men ; hence it has 
been taken for certain that the Egyptian gods, like 
some of the Grecian heroes, were men who gained the 
honour of deification by their services to mankind. 
But these were the secondary gods; that is to say, 
persons who were regarded as divine for the reasons 
we have just stated. Thus Athothes, the son of 
Thoth, who is perhaps the same individual elsewhere 
called Thoth, is said to have practised physic, and to 
have written books on anatomy ; or the works that 
were performed by the priest, into whom an emanation 
from the god had been infused, were ascribed to the 
fictitious divinity himself. 

This solution of the problem before us is supported 
by the express testimony of Diodorus. Having 
recorded the fables related of the celestial gods, whom 
he represents, as we have seen, as personifications of 
the elements or daemons supposed to reside in the 
elements, this historian concludes, " such are the 
stories told by the Egyptians of the heavenly and 
immortal gods. And besides these, they say there 
are others that are terrestrial, who were begotten of 
these former gods, and were originally mortal men, 
but, by reason of their wisdom and beneficence to 
all mankind, have obtained immortality ; of which 
number some have been kings of Egypt ; several of 
whom by interpretation have had the same names with 
the celestial gods ; others have kept their own proper 
names ; for they pretend that Sol, Saturn, Rhea, &c. 






TO THE WORSHIP OF MEN. 349 

reigned in Egypt/'* It is evident that Diodorus 
alludes here to such kings as we find in the lists of 
Eratosthenes, and Manethon.f 

These double names created confusion in the 
Egyptian traditions, of which the chronological com- 
pilers, such as Manethon, availed themselves, in order 
to magnify the antiquity of Egypt, and fill up the 
chasms in their historical cycle. For the genuine series 
of kings not extending to a sufficiently remote epoch, 
and a tradition being current that the gods had 
reigned in Egypt in early times, nothing was more 
easy than to patch up two or three additional 
dynasties, by putting down the names of the gods, and 
to assign to them whatever vacuum might remain to 
be filled up in that cycle or imaginary period of 
celestial revolutions with which they had resolved to 
connect the duration of the Egyptian monarchy. 

We are thus enabled to account for the contradic- 
tions that occur in the works of ancient authors, who 
sometimes assert that the Egyptian gods were deified 
mortals, at others that they were personifications of 
the elements or heavenly bodies. 

* Diodor. Bibl. lib. i. cap. 1. Booth's translation, 
f See below, Orig. iEgypt. 



350 ANTIQUITY OF THE WORSHIP 



SECTION IX. 

Of the Antiquity of the Worship of Animals in Egypt, 

It has been pretended by some writers, that the 
worship of animals in Egypt was comparatively a 
modern practice, introduced a short time before the 
invasion of that country by Cambyses. It is difficult to 
conjecture on what grounds such an assertion can have 
been made, since all historical testimony refers this 
superstition to the earliest ages of the Egyptian history. 
The history of the golden calf, set up by Aaron in 
the wilderness, proves that images were made in 
the form of animals as early as the time of the depar- 
ture of the Hebrews. Indeed, in the prohibitions of 
the Mosaic law, the most remarkable classes of deified 
animals are enumerated, as well as the most striking 
of those celestial objects which, as we have shown, 
the Egyptians adored with allegorical rites and fictions. 
cc Take ye good heed," says the inspired lawgiver, 
whose injunctions and whole system of theology 
display so remarkable a contrast with those of the 
wisest pagans, tc for ye saw no manner of similitude 
on that day when Jehovah spake unto you in Horeb 
out of the midst of fire— Take heed, lest ye corrupt 
yourselves, and make you a graven image, the simi- 
litude of any figure, the likeness of male or female, 
the likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the 
likeness of any winged fozd that Jlieth in the air, 
the likeness of any thing that creepeth on the ground, 



OF ANIMALS IN EGYPT. 351 

the likeness of any fish that is in the waters beneath 
the earth ; and — lest thou lift up thine eyes unto 
heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, 
and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldst 
be driven to worship them, which Jehovah thy God 
hath divided unto all nations under the whole 
heaven/'* 

It may be conjectured that images made of wood 
or stone, in the forms of animals, were worshipped at 
this time in Egypt, but that the adoration of living 
animals was not introduced until a later age. It appears 
however, that it was unlawful for the Egyptians to 
kill sheep in the time of Joseph. Living animals, 
were therefore consecrated in this early age. Indeed, 
if the account which we have given of the motives 
that induced the Egyptians to worship animals is 
correct, the adoration of the living creature must have 
preceded that of the image or representative. 

It is asserted by Manethon, in the fragments pre- 
served by Eusebius and Africanus, that the worship 
of Apis, Mnevis, and Mendes, was introduced in the 
reign of Caiachos, or Chous, who was the tenth in 
descent from Menes, the first king. 

Many authors have remarked the traces of animal 
worship among the Greeks.f These must have been 

* Deuteron. chap. iv. 

f This argument is used by Dr. Shuckford. See Shuckford's 
Connections of Sacred and Profane History, vol. ii. p. 310. 
See also, Clemens Alexand. Admonit. ad Gentes and the Birds 
of Aristophanes. 

Rhadamanthus, the famous Cretan lawgiver, ordered the 
Cretans to swear by animals. This seems to be a very ancient 
relick of animal worship. See Porphyr. de Abst. lib. iii.p. 285. 

z z 



352 WORSHIP OF ANIMALS 

derived from the earliest Egyptian colonies^ which 
were founded by Cecrops, and Danaus, among the 
barbarous Pelasgi. Consequently the worship of 
animals must have been more ancient in Egypt than 
the era of the first civilization of Greece. 

On the whole it may be concluded,, that the adora- 
tion of living animals and plants is a superstition 
which refers itself to the first ages of the Egyptian 
bistorv. 






NOTE 

ON 

BOOK IV. CHAPTER I. 



If any doubt remains with respect to the motives which 
induced the Egyptians to pay divine honours to brute creatures 
and to men, notwithstanding the testimonies of the ancients 
which we have adduced in the foregoing section, it will be 
entirely removed by comparing these superstitions with those 
rites of a similar description which prevail among the Hindoos. 

The customs of the Hindoos in this particular, the whole 
©f their superstition relating to sacred animals, and the strange 
and wild fables of their avatars or incarnations of gods in 
the shapes of men and other creatures, bear so remarkable 
a resemblance to the ideas and customs of the Egyptians, 
that the comparison cannot fail to afford some curious and 
interesting observations. 

The whole of the Indian idolatry, including under this name 
the worship of visible objects of whatever kind, animate and 
inanimate, the productions, of nature or the workmanship 
of man, is founded on the same principle to which we have 
referred on the authority of several ancient philosophers, 
the veneration of men, animals, and plants among the old 
Egyptians. 

" The Deity," says Mr. Ward, " becomes, according to 
their ideas, individuated, and takes possession of every form 
of matter." It is the same god, as Krishna says, " which is 
seen in the reverend Brahman, perfected in knowledge ; in the 
dog, and in him who eateth the flesh of dogs." Among the 
regular Hindoos the beings supposed to possess most of this 
energy, or in whom the presiding deity eminently dwells, are 



354 ILLUSTRATION OF THE MOTIVES 

the gods, the giants, the brahmans, and devout ascetics. 
Among the heterodox sects, ascetics are almost exclusively 
considered as the favoured depositories of the divine energy." 

So fully are the Hindoos possessed with this notion that 
God pervades every thing, and manifests a greater portion of 
himself in one form than another, that many, as the same 
author assures us, u wander away a whole life in search of a 
man in whom God pre-eminently dwells/' Hence, the wor- 
ship of the grand Lama of Tibet, and the various Moonis who 
transmit the indwelling portion of divinity, the " divinse 
particulam aurae," by hereditary descent. 

But we shall confine ourselves to the notions of the regular 
Hindoos, and only mention a few striking particulars. 

To begin with the worship of Men. "All the Brahmans," 
says the excellent author lately quoted, " but especially the 
religious guides or Gooroos, are objects of worship among the 
Hindoos, and have divine honours paid them. The spiritual 
guide, in the estimation of the disciple, is literally a god. 
Wherever he approaches, the disciple prostrates himself in the 
dust before him." 

In like manner the prophets of the Egyptians were supposed 
not merely to receive communications of supernatural wis- 
dom from the gods, but, as we learn from Manethon, actually 
to partake of the divine essence ; to have indwelling portions 
or irradiation of the divinity within them. 

The Shastras declare, moreover, that the daughters of Brah- 
mans, till they are eight years old, are objects of worship as 
forms of Bhagavati. " Some persons worship these girls daily. 
The devotee, taking the daughter of some neighbouring 
brahman, and placing her on a seat, offers flowers, &c. and 
pays adoration to her." At the festivals of some female divi- 
nities, the daughters of brahmans have divine honours paid 
to them. 

Like the man worshipped by the Egyptians in the rites of 
Anabis, as we have shown from Porphyry in the preceding 
pages, the human being who receives the adoration of the 
Hindoos, partakes of the offerings. " She even has a share of 



FOR WORSHIPPING ANIMALS. 355 

the spirituous liquors, and of the flesh though it should be that 
of the Cow." The refuse is eaten by the persons present, 
however different their castes ; nor must any one refuse to 
partake of these offerings.* 

Cows also are worshipped as forms or emanations of 
Bhagavati; and the excrement and urine of this animal are 
supposed to have the virtue of purifying whatever they touch. 

Even images are supposed literally to contain the god; 
and no image is worshipped in India without a preparatory 
ceremony, in which the Brahman, by repeating incantations, 
persuades the divinity to come and dwell in the shrine of clay, 
wood, or stone. After this performance, the image is a god : 
beforehand, nobody thinks it an object of reverence.f 

This may suffice for illustrating the principle of animal 
worship among the Hindoos. We shall make a few further 
remarks on the incarnations of the gods, which the Hindoos 
have founded on this doctrine, and on the kinds of visible 
objects they have made choice of. Under both heads we 
confine ourselves strictly to such observations as seem likely 
to illustrate the superstitions of Egypt. 

The idea is in itself singular and absurd enough, that the 
divinity should for any imaginable purpose be under the 
necessity of assuming the disguise of brutes of various descrip- 
tions, some of them the most noxious and disgusting. It is still 
more remarkable that we should trace this whimsical doctrine 
in the religious systems of the two most ancient nations of an- 
tiquity ; this would be unaccountable, if we allowed no common 
origin to both superstitions, but that this last supposition 
contains the true explanation of the enigma, is proved by the 
coincidences in particular fables and customs. 

1. Of Sacred Quadrupeds. 

Among quadrupeds, the Hindoos, as it is well-known, ascribe 
the highest honours to the ox kind, and especially to cows. 
In these points they coincide with the Egyptians. 

* Ward, vol. i. p. 247. f Ibid. vol. ii. p. 13. 



356 ILLUSTRATION OF THE MOTIVES 

We need not remind the reader of the close coincidence to 
be traced in the feelings of these people with respect to the 
horror they express at the idea of eating the flesh of the cow. 
Even Europeans are regarded on this account by the Hindoos 
as on a level with the degraded Parriars ;* and with similar 
abhorrence the Greeks were regarded by the Egyptians. 

Among the chosen vehicles for manifesting the gods to men, 
the Cat holds an honourable rank in the Asiatic as well as in the 
African mythology. The books of the Hindoos contain the 
history of an incarnation of Indra in the form of a cat.f 

The chaste Bubastis, goddess of child-birth, was, as we 
have seen, a cat. The Hindoo Shashti, the protectress of 
children, is figured riding upon a cat; and the Hindoos, and 
especially mothers, avoid hurting this animal, lest the goddess 
should revenge herself upon their children. J 

The dog sacred to Kala Bhairava,|| a form of Siva, and the 
jackall of Durga, remind us of the barking Anubis, the 
companion of Osiris, and the she-wolf of Dian or Isis, and the 
bitch of Hecate. The dogs of Yama, one of which was 
termed Cerbura, or spotted, and was feigned to have three 
heads, corresponds remarkably, as Mr. Wilford has observed, 
with the three-headed Cerberus, the dog of Pluto. 

The divine monkey Hanuman is, according to the Brahmans, 
an incarnation of Siva. Whether the monkey-gods of Egypt 
were so nearly related to the celestial daemons, we want in- 
formation to decide. 

The elephant, lion, buffalo, rat, deer, goat, &c. receive 
worship at the festivals of the gods who are figured riding 
upon them. 



2. Of Birds worshipped by the Hindoos. 

Of birds, the fabulous are the most celebrated. Garura, the 
bird of Vishnu, has some features in his history which approxi- 

* Dr. F. Buchanan's Journey through Mysore, Canara, and 
Malabar. 

t Ward, vol. i. p. 44. i Ibid. p. 182. || Ibid. p. 264. 



FOR WORSHIPPING ANIMALS. 357 

mate to the marvels of the Phoenix, to whose name his 
epithet Pannaga-sana bears perhaps an accidental resemblance. 
A species of kite, called the Coromandel Eagle, a sacred 
owl, peacock, and goose, recal the fictions which the classical 
mythology derived from Egypt. 



3. Of Fishes, Reptiles, and Inanimate Objects. 

We do not find so important a worship paid to reptiles and 
fishes in India as in Egypt. Yet the latter receive inferior 
honours from the modern Hindoos, and the Fish, and the Tor- 
toise avatars, are as famous in the legends of the Pauranics, as 
the fish of Venus, or any of the Nilotic amphibia in the theo- 
cracy of the West. 

Sacred trees and shrubs in India were equally venerable 
with the sacred plants in Egypt. They are considered as 
forms of particular gods. 

Each of the celestial bodies worshipped in India has an 
appropriate sacred plant; the counterpart, it would seem, of 
the Egyptian herbs dedicated to the horoscopes or genii of the 
Signs. 

It is forbidden to the Hindoos to eat onions, though they 
do not consider them as gods. The deification of this plant 
has been imputed to the Egyptians on account of their scruple 
against eating them. 

Lastly, the consecration of stones, as the Salgrama and 
bther inanimate things, which are supposed to receive particles 
of the divine essence, remind us of the mystical stones of the 
Egyptians and the Arabian talismans. 



CHAPTER II. 

SACRIFICES, FESTIVALS, AND RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES 
OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

From the veneration with which animals were re- 
garded in Egypt, we might conjecture that it was 
accounted impious to slaughter them in sacrifice, and 
Macrobius positively asserts this to have been the fact. 
iC Nunquam fuit fasvEgypthspecudibus aut sanguine, 
sed precibus et thure solo placare deos/'* This tenet 
was perhaps maintained by a party of the Egyptian 
priests, or it might be enjoined in some of the sacred 
books, as it is by several of the modern sects in India; 
but we are well assured, that animals were offered as 
victims in the temples of most of the Egyptian gods. 
In general, it was unlawful in each nome to slaughter 
the animal which represented the tutelar god of the 
district. 

The motives with which the people of different 
countries have offered animals as victims to the gods, 
have not always been the same. It would seem, 
indeed, that they were at first similar, because this 
universal practice must have been derived from one 
origin, but the ideas which were at first connected with 

* Mac. Sat. lib. i. c. 7» 

AAA 



360 IDEAS CONNECTED WITH THE 

the performance of sacrifice, were by some nations 
partially or totally forgotten. The prevailing idea of 
the Greeks, in the Homeric age, seems to have been 
that the gods were a sort of aerial beings, who were 
fattened by the savoury odour that arose from roasting 
a victim, and were to be rendered favourable to the 
wishes of men by affording them a good meal.* The 
same idea may be traced in the practices of many 
half- civilized nations. 

But the sentiments with which the Egyptians 
performed sacrifice were very different. The idea of 
feeding the gods seems never to have entered into 
their contemplation. Their sacrifices were, simply, 
offerings of expiation. The guilt of the people was 
supposed to be transferred from the offenders to 

* This idea is ridiculed by Porphyry, who shows that it was 
the prevailing notion that the gods derived their sustenance 
from the exhalations of sacrifices. He cites the following lines: 

hrfKrrog dvopovv, Harris iMi$et Qeovs 
Q<rrujv dv&pKuiv ko) %oA^£ irupovf^svrjs, 
& kol) Ttvcrh rfeivobo-iv ovy^i tpuxr^a,, 
ypd^eiv ditavras xa) yipocg X&y/iv rofo. 

" Who is such a fool, and so stupid and credulous, 
as to believe, that all the gods are delighted with the 
bare bones and with the burnt gall of a victim, which 
will scarcely afford a meal to a hungry dog?" 

See Porphyry de Abstinentia, lib. ii. sec. 42, 58. That this 
was the idea with which the Greeks performed sacrifice is evi- 
dent from the story of Prometheus, who offended Jupiter by 
giving him the bones instead of the best pieces of meat. 
Hesiod. Theog. v. 536. See also Clemens Alexand. Strom.vii. 
p. 846, edit. Oxon, and the passages collected in the Notes 
by the editor. 



PERFORMANCE OF SACRIFICE. 361 

the animal slaughtered ; the punishment of their sins, 
was, in some solemnities, imprecated by the officiating 
priest on the head of the victim, and its death was 
supposed to be viewed by the gods as an atonement, 
or as a vicarious satisfaction. This will appear clearly 
in the sequel. 



Of Human Sacrifices. 

As there was scarcely any ancient people who 
were not in the habit of immolating animals on the 
altars of their gods, so there were few whose 
history betrays no traces of human sacrifices. Even 
the Hebrews cannot be entirely vindicated from the 
guilt of having perpetrated human sacrifice,* notwith- 
standing the positive prohibition of the Mosaic law. 

Some writers have vainly endeavoured to rescue 
the Egyptians from the charge of having been ad- 
dicted to these horrible perpetrations. Herodotus is 
very peremptory on this subject. Still he could not 
remove the prejudice of his countrymen, and they 
continued to repeat, as a proverbial expression, the 
following line of Homer. 

* I allude to the history of Jephthah, which some Commen- 
tators have so strangely perverted from its obvious meaning. 
Michaelis is the only author who seems to have placed this 
subject in the point of view in which it ought to be consi- 
dered. See this author's Commentaries on the Mosaic Law; 
and Bruns iiber Randolph's Erkliirung in Eichhornn's Reper- 
torium, Th. viii. 

t Strabon. Geog. lib. 17. 



362 EGYPTIAN SACRIFICES 

Virgil mentions the cruel sacrifices of Busiris, as a 
matter universally known. 

" Quis aut Eurysthea durum, 
Aut illaudati nescit Busiridis aras?"* 

And Ovid, still more explicitly. 

<c Cum Thrasius Busirin adit monstratque piari 
Hospitis efFuso sanguine posse Jovem."f 

Diodorus also declares, that it had been the custom 
in ancient times to immolate men with red hair at the 
tomb of Osiris. \ That these sacrifices were really 
performed, we are also assured by Manethon,§ Plu- 
tarch, || Porphyry, 5 and Minutius Felix.** To these 
authorities we may add those of Longus and Apuleius, 
in the romances of Theagenes and the Golden Ass.ff 

But all doubt on this subject has been cleared up 
since the late researches in the Egyptian temples, by 
European travellers. The sculptures and paintings 
on the walls of the temples, and in the interior of the 
catacombs or tombs of the kings in the Thebaid, have 

* Georgic. iv. v. 5. f Ovid. Amor. i. 64. 

% Diod. lib. i. c. 6. 

§ Manetho. apud Porphyr. de Abstin. lib. iv. p. 94. 

|| Plut.de Isid. c.73. 

% Porphyry says that these practices were discontinued in the 
time of Amosis. We learn from Athenasus, that a work was 
composed by one Seleucus, treating expressly of the human 
sacrifices practised by the Egyptians. — Athen. lib.iv. p. 172. 

** Minut. Felix Octuo. p. 29. 

ft According to Manethon^ it was in ancient times the 
custom to burn men alive in the city of Eilythia; after which, 
the ashes of the victims were winnowed through a sieve, and 
dispersed in the air. — Plut. ubi supra. 



©F HUMAN VICTIMS. 363 

afforded many curious pieces of information respecting 
the religious ceremonies, the sciences, and the private 
manners of the Egyptian people. On the question 
respecting human sacrifices, they leave us no room 
for hesitation. M. Denon has found the ceremony of 
immolating the human victim distinctly portrayed 
in a temple at Medinet-Abou ; and Mr. Hamilton has 
given us an excellent description of a similar proceed- 
ing, exhibited on the cieling of an apartment in the 
temple of Isis at Tentyra. The figure of a man, with 
the head and ears of an ass, is seen kneeling on the 
ground, and bound to a tree. Two knives have been 
stuck into his forehead, two are in his shoulders, one 
in his thigh, and another in his body. Five priests 
stand in a row behind, having heads like hawks and 
dogs, and holding knives in their hands. The god is 
clothed in long white robes, and holds in his hand* 
the crozier and the van of Osiris. 



Of the Sacrifices of Animals. 

Herodotus informs us, that the Egyptians refused to 
offer in sacrifice any other animals than swine, bulls, 
calves without spot or blemish, and geese. It appears, 
liowever, that he alludes to the common practices of 
the whole Egyptian nation ; for it is certain that some 
other animals were immolated in particular districts. 



Of the Sacrifice of Swine. 

Swine were only sacrificed to Osiris and to the 
Moon. On those occasions, the Egyptians ate th$ 



364 SACRIFICES OP SWINE. 

flesh of swine,, which at all other times they accounted 
it unlawful to touch. Their reason for this practice 
Herodotus says he knew, but did not think it becoming 
to disclose.* 

The following is the account given by this histo- 
rian, of the sacrifice of hogs to Osiris. " At the 
supper which was celebrated on the day of the festival 
of that god, every Egyptian slaughtered a hog before 
the door of his house, and immediately afterwards 
gave the carcase to the swineherd from whom he had 
purchased it, who was allowed to carry it away/' In 
other respects, this solemn feast of Osiris was an exact 
counterpart of the celebrated festival of the Greeks in 
honour of Bacchus. f 

The sacrifice to the Moon is thus described. After 
slaughtering the animal, they cut off the end of the 
tail, and having enclosed these, together with the 
spleen and the omentum, and the fat of the belly, 
consumed them in the fire. The remainder of the 
flesh was, on this occasion, eaten by the people. 
Those persons who were indigent, made the figure of 
a swine with meal, and having roasted it, offered it as 
a sacrifice. 

* This reminds us of the prohibition against eating hog*s 
flesh among the Hebrews ; but the latter people seem to have 
avoided it for a different reason. Many motives have been 
assigned for the command given by Moses to abstain from the 
flesh of swine. Spencer alone seems to have formed a correct 
idea. " Judaeos antiquiores odio eo majore porcum habuisse, 
quod animal esset in Gentilium februis, sacrifices, mysteriis 
magicis, festis, et pactis sanciendis cum primis usurpatum.'' 
•—Spencer de Legg. Hebr. p. 120, lib, i. 

f Herodotus, lib. ii. c, 47. 






SACRIFICES OF BULLS. 365 



Of the Sacrifice of Bulls. 

Some of the Egyptian customs, in their sacrifices, 
bear a curious resemblance to the rites of the Mosaic 
law, which cannot be refer red to accidental coincidence. 

All the females of this species were in a peculiar 
manner sacred to Isis, and were never used as victims * 
The Egyptians used only red bullocks in sacrifice,, 
and in this respect were so attentive, that an animal 
which had onlv one black or white hair was deemed 
unfit or impure, f The tail was minutely examined, 
and the direction of every hair in it observed. The 
tongue was also drawn out, and the priest examined 
it, to see if it were free from certain blemishes specified 
in the sacred books. After the priest had carefully 
inspected the animal, both standing and lying on its 
back, if he found it without blemish, he bound its 
horns with the C( Byblos, and put a seal upon it, 
containing the impression of a man upon his knees, 
with his hand tied behind him, and a sword pointed 
at his throat. "J The meaning of this seems to have 
been, that the animal was to be killed as a vicarious 

* Herodotus, lib. ii. cap. 99. 

f Herod, lib. 2, cap. 38. Confer Plut. de Isid. cap. 31. 
It was also forbidden to the Hebrews to sacrifice an heifer that 
was not red, without blemish. — See Numbers xix. 2. On 
which Maimonides and the Talmudists remark, that if the 
heifer had only two black or white hairs, it was reckoned 
impure. — See Bochart, Hierozoicon, p. 290. Plutarch says 
the Egyptians chose bulls with reference to the complexion of 
Typhon. 

J Castor apud Plut. loc. citat. 



366 SACRIFICES OF BULLS. 

sacrifice instead of the person who offered it. The 
bullock was then led to the altar, on which a fire was 
kindled and a libation poured ; after an invocation to 
the god, the victim was killed, and its head was im- 
mediately cut off. A solemn curse was pronounced 
upon the head of the animal ; the priest imprecating 
upon it all the evils that threatened those who had 
offered the victim, or, in public sacrifices, the land 
of Egypt in general * Plutarch seems to have 
supposed that the imprecation was pronounced 
previously to the slaughtering of the victim. The 
head which had been cursed was then cut off and 
thrown into the Nile.f Such was the ancient custom 
of the Egyptians; but in later times they sold the 
heads of their victims to the Greeks, instead of 
throwing them into the river. These ceremonies 
were observed by all the Egyptians without excep- 
tion ; and on account of the custom of cursing the 
head of the victim, no person of that nation would eat 
of the head either of a bullock or any other animal. 

The sacrifice of an ox to Isis, whom Herodotus 
calls the greatest of their goddesses, and in whose 
honour the most considerable festival was solemnized, 
is thus described. cc They keep a fast previously, 
and after invoking the goddess, slaughter the victim, 
and then skin it, and take out the entrails, leaving 

* See Leviticus xvii. 4; xvi. 21. Sam. i. 16. Psalms 
vii. 17. Ezech. xxxiii. 4. Acts xviii. 6. " And Aaron shall 
lay his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over 
him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their 
transgressions, putting them upon the head of the goat."— 
Levit. xvi. 21. See also Euseb. Preep. Evang. lib. i. 

t Plutarch, ubi supra. 



SACRIFICE OF BULLS. 367 

the fat and the remaining parts in the body. Then 
cutting off the legs, the extremity of the chord, the 
shoulders and the neck, they fill the rest of the body 
with pure bread and honey, raisins, figs, frankincense, 
myrrh, and other aromatics; they then burn it, 
pouring upon it abundance of oil. While the victim 
is burning, they whip themselves, and when the 
whipping scene is concluded, they feast on the 
residue of the carcase/'* 



Sacrifices of Sheep. 

Strabo asserts that sheep were no w r here offered to 
the gods in Egypt, except in the Nitriotic nome, 
where Sarapis was worshipped; but Herodotus says 
they were sacrificed in the Mendesian district, of 
which Pan, under the form of a male-goat, was the 
tutelar god.f 

Even the Thebans, who held the sheep to be 
particularly sacred, their favourite god Ammon being 
of this species, put a ram to death once in the year, 
at the annual festival of Jupiter. They then placed 
the skin of the animal upon the image of Ammon, and 
introduced before it the figure of Hercules. After 
this ceremony, the whole crowd around the temple 
whipped the ram, and afterwards interred it, enclosed 
in a sacred chest. vj These were the only occasions 
on which the Thebans suffered any creature of this 
species to be killed. 

* Herod, ii. 40. f Strabo, lib. xvii. Herod, ii. 42. 

J Herod, ii. 42. 

B B B 



368 EGYPTIAN SACRIFICES AND OTHER CEREMONIES. 



Sacrifice of Goats, 

Goats were the victims immolated to the Thehan 
Jupiter or Amnion, but with what particular rites this 
sacrifice was performed we are not told.* 



Of Ceremonies relating to Typhon. 

There is nothing more curious in the Egyptian 
ceremonies than those which had respect to Typhon. 
Some of these rites were intended to soothe and 
mollify his temper; but the most remarkable seem to 
have been designed as expressions of resentment and 
indignation for the evils which he was supposed 
to have inflicted on the favourite divinities of the 
Egyptians. On these occasions, the people assailed 
with insults and reproaches all who happened to have 
red hair, in which they were supposed to resemble 
Typhon. The people of Coptos had also a custom 
of throwing an ass down a precipice. The ass was 
one of the Typhonian animals. f 

At a festival which, from the account given of it by 
Herodotus, seems to have been the same that Plutarch 
describes as happening on the seventeenth of Athyri 
in commemoration of the death of Osiris, it was a 
custom among the Egyptians to bring forth the dead 
body of a cow, which lay embalmed in one of their 

* Herod. 

f This was, according to Plutarch, on account of his colour. 
Bochart remarks that asses in Palestine and Egypt are gene- 
rally red. Bochart. Hierozoic. p. 181. 



CEREMONIES RELATING TO TYPHON. 369 

temples. On that occasion, the persons present 
whipped a certain god, whose name Herodotns does 
not choose to reveal. Jablonski has shown, by a 
reference to a passage of Diodorns Siculus, that this 
god was Typhon.* 

On a similar principle, the Egyptians attempted to 
avert impending evils by torturing their gods. When 
any great drought happened, occasioned by extreme 
heat, or when they were afflicted by pestilence or any 
other public calamity, the priests were accustomed to 
select some of the sacred animals, and, conducting 
them with great mystery and silence into some dark 
place, first attempted by threats to terrify them, and 
induce them to remove the evils their country suffered ; 
but if this endeavour was unsuccessful, they at length 
put them to death. f This proceeding took place at 
no particular time, but whenever the occasion required. 
It was always done secretly by the priests,, without the 
knowledge of the people. 



Annual Festivals of the Egyptians, 

Of the annual festivals of the Egyptians, the 
most distinguished was that celebrated in honour of 
Bubastis, at the city of Bubastos. The second 
was the festival of Isis, held at the city of Busiris, 
which was situated in the middle of the Delta, and 
contained the largest temple of that goddess. Next 
to this was the festival of Minerva, at Sais, which was 

* Jablonski Panth. iEgypt. lib. v. c. 2. Confer Diodor. 
lib.i. p. 23. 

t Plut. de Isid. c. 73. 



370 FESTIVALS AT BUBASTOS, BUSIRIS, SAIS, 

more celebrated than that of the Sun at Heliopolis ; 
the latter was reckoned the fourth in dignity and 
importance; that of Latona or Bulos was the fifth, 
and the festival of Mars at Pap rem is was the sixth. 

At the festival of Bubastos a vast concourse of people 
assembled ; not fewer as it was said, than seven hundred 
thousand men and women, without including children. 
The crowd resorted to the city in vessels, and during 
their voyage made the air resound on every side with 
the noise of pipes and tabors, with singing and clap- 
ping of hands. When they approached any town on 
their passage to Bubastos, they brought their vessels 
to shore ; some of the women then continued their 
music, while others called aloud on the females of the 
place, provoking them with insults, dancing all the 
time, and using the most wanton and indecent gestures. 
This scene was repeated at every town on the course 
of the river. When they arrived at Bubastos, they 
slaughtered a great many victims, and on this occasion 
more wine was consumed than during all the remain- 
der of the year. 

At the festival of Isis at Busiris, the sacrifice of oxen 
took place which we have above described. On this 
occasion the whole assembly to the number of many 
thousands, whipped themselves. The Carians, who 
happened to be resident in Egypt, also cut their faces 
with knives. 

The festival of Minerva at Sais was held by night: 
it was called the feast of lamps. All the people 
suspended lamps before their houses, which they kept 
burning through the whole night. Not only Sais was 
illuminated, but all Egypt likewise; for those who 
did not attend the festival burnt lamps before their 
houses on the evening dedicated to this goddess. 



PAPREMIS TIME OF CELEBRATING THEM. 371 

The festivals of Heliopolis and Butos were distin- 
guished by no remarkable ceremonies : they consisted 
simply in the performance of certain sacrifices. The 
rites in honour of Mars at Papremis were very 
remarkable. At this festival, a great number of 
priests, armed with clubs, placed themselves in the 
evening at the entrance of the temple, while the 
regular attendants on the god began to draw onu 
four-wheeled carriage the image of Mars, placed in 
a case of gold. This image had been purposely 
removed from its place on the preceding day. The 
armed priests at the entrance of the temple disputed 
the passage ; when a crowd of men, armed likewise 
with clubs, who stood without prepared for the 
conflict, immediately came to the succour of the god. 
A sharp engagement then ensued, and many heads 
were broken in the fray, though the Egyptians posi- 
tively asserted that no lives were lost. 

Some other festivals of the Egyptians have been 
mentioned above, as connected with the rites, and 
bearing a reference to the history of Isis and Osiris. 
It is unnecessary to say any thing further respecting 
them in this place. 

There is one common circumstance relating to the 
times at which most of the Egyptian festivals were 
solemnized; — they were held at the New Moon 
or the Full Moon. This is particularly noticed, in 
several instances, by the ancient writers who have 
given us an account of these solemnities.* 

* This circumstance has not escaped Jablonski, who notices 
it in the Prolegomena to his ^Egyptian Pantheon. 

This is expressly mentioned by Plutarch with respect to the 



372 TIMES OF HOLDING FESTIVALS. 

festival in the month Phamenoth, which happened at the 
full moon, at which period the entrance of Osiris into the 
Moon, and the fertilizing of the sublunary world, was cele- 
brated : cap. 43. Likewise the festival relating to the death 
of Osiris was solemnized at the full moon in the month 
Athyri : cap. 42. Other references to the periods of the Moon 
occur in Plutarch's Treatise. See capp. 42, 43, 52. The 
festival of Osiris, and that of Isis, are mentioned by Herodotus* 
They happened both at the full of the Moon. 



CHAPTER III. 

OF THE CIVIL INSTITUTIONS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 

SECTION I. 

Distribution of the People into Castes. Enumeration of the 
Castes, and Description of them. 

Among the institutions of Egypt, none was more 
important in its influence upon the character of the 
nation, than the division of the people into tribes or 
families, who were obliged by the laws and supersti- 
tions of the country to follow without deviation the 
professions and habits of their forefathers. Such an 
institution could not fail of impressing the stamp 
of abject servility on the lower classes; and, by re- 
moving in a great measure the motive of emulation, 
it must have created, in all, apathy and indifference to 
improvement in their particular professions. Where- 
ever the system of castes has existed, it has pro- 
duced a remarkably permanent and uniform character 
in the nation ; as in the example furnished by 
the natives of Hindoostan. These people agree in 
almost every point with the description given of 
them by Megasthenes, who visited the court of an 
Indian king soon after the conquest of the East by 
the Macedonians. 

We have no very accurate and circumstantial 
accounts of the castes into which the Egyptian 



374 CIVIL INSTITUTIONS. 

people were divided, and of the particular customs 
of each. It appears, indeed, that innovations 
on the old civil and religious constitution of Egypt 
had begun to be introduced as early as the time of 
Psammitichus, when the ancient aversion of the people 
to foreigners was first overcome. The various conflicts 
which the nation underwent between that era and the 
time when Herodotus visited Egypt, could not fail to 
break down many of the fences which ancient priest- 
craft had established, for maintaining the influence of 
superstition. Herodotus is the earliest writer who 
mentions the castes or hereditary classes of the 
Egyptians, and his account appears to be the result 
of his personal observation only. Had this historian 
understood the native language of the people ; had 
he been able to read the books of Hermes, in which 
the old sacerdotal institutions were contained, we 
might have expected from him as correct and ample 
a description of the distribution of the castes in 
Egypt, as that which modern writers have gained in 
India from the code of Menu, respecting the orders 
and subdivision of the community in Hindoostan. 
Diodorus, who had the advantage of consulting- 
Egyptian authors in the Greek language, and who 
seems to have made a diligent use of this opportunity, 
may be supposed to be more accurate, in what refers 
to the internal polity of this nation, than Herodotus, 
who, though a diligent observer, was deficient in so 
many important qualifications. 

It has often been conjectured that the subdivision 
of people into castes may have taken its rise from 
the intermixture of various nations, or may have been 
the effect of repeated conquests, the vanquished races 



OP THE EGYPTIANS. 375 

being continually degraded into a lower rank in the 
community. It has been supposed, for example, that 
the abject Parriars are the descendants of the abori- 
ginal inhabitants of India ; that these people were 
first conquered and reduced into subordination by 
Sudras, who may have been for some time the domi- 
neering caste, until they in turn were overcome by 
the Brahmans and Cshatriyas, who forced them to 
become labourers, and still further degraded the 
Parriars into the lowest station of servility. It is 
possible that this conjecture may be not wholly 
without foundation, as far as it relates to the people 
of Hindoostan; but we have no countenance from 
history for attempting to apply such a solution to the 
same problem in Egypt. The people of Egypt are 
constantly described as one unmixed and undivided 
nation. We have not the slightest hint that there 
existed among them any diversity of race or of 
language, and we have grounds for concluding that 
the idioms of the several castes, as well as those 
prevailing in the various districts of Egypt, were not 
remarkably different from each other.* 

Strabo has mentioned, in a very summary manner, 
the division of the Egyptian nation into classes. He 
distinguishes the two higher ranks, namely, the 
sacerdotal and the military classes, and includes all the 
remainder of the community under the designation 

* The analysis of geographical names alone affords suffi- 
cient data for drawing this inference, which is placed beyond 
doubt by a comparison of the dialects of the Egyptian language, 
viz. the Coptic, the Sahidic, and Bahiric or Memphitic. 

c c c 



376 CIVIL INSTITUTIONS OF EGYPT. 

of the agricultural class, to whom he assigns the 
employments of agriculture and the arts.* 

Diodorus subdivides this latter class. After dis- 
tinguishing from it the sacerdotal and military orders, 
he observes that the remainder of the community is 
distributed into three divisions, which he terms, 

3. Herdsmen. 

4. Agriculturists; and 

5. Artificers, or men who laboured at trades. 
Herodotus very nearly agrees in his enumeration 

with that of Diodorus. His names for the different 
classes are as follow : 

1 . Priests, or the sacerdotal class. 

2. Warriors, or the military class. 

3. Cowherds. 

4. Swineherds. 

5. Traders. 

6. Interpreters. 

7. Pilots, f 

In this catalogue the third and fourth class are 
plainly subdivisions of the third of Diodorus, whom 
that writer includes under the general title of herdsmen. 
The caste of interpreters, as well as that of pilots, must 
have comprised a very small number of men, since 
the Egyptians had little intercourse with foreigners, 
and all their navigation was confined to sailing up 
and down the Nile. The pilots were probably a 
tribe of the same class with the artificers or labouring 
artisans of Diodorus.§ The traders of Herodotus 

* Strabo, lib. xvii. 

f It is remarkable that Megasthencs, in his Account of the 
Indian Castes, mentions the Navigators of rivers (Naurai ?w 
irvrapwp) as a part of the class of artisans, or TepQ/lreu. 

§ Diod. Sic. lib. i. 



DIVISION OF CASTES. 377 

must be the same class who are called agriculturists 
by Diodorus. 

Thus, by comparing the different accounts, we 
are enabled to arrange the several branches of the 
Egyptian community in the following classes : 

J . The Sacerdotal order. 

2. The Military. 

3. The Herdsmen. 

4. The Agricultural and Commercial class. 

5. The Artificers, or labouring Artisans. 

The employments of all these classes were heredi- 
tary, and no man was allowed by the law to engage in 
any occupation different from that in which he had 
been educated by his parents.* This prohibition 
must obviously have extended further than the 
limitation of the above mentioned classes, each of 
which comprehended a variety of distinct occupations. 
Hence it would appear that every class was sub- 
divided into a number of castes, the individuals com- 
prised in each being bound to follow a particular 
profession, inherited from their ancestry. 

It was accounted an honourable distinction to 
belong either to the sacerdotal or the military class. 
The other orders were considered greatly inferior in 
dignity, f and no Egyptian could mount the throne 
who was not descended from the priesthood or the 
soldiery. J The possession of the soil of Egypt 
belonged exclusively to these two classes, and to the 
king, by whom it was let out at easy rents to the 
husbandmen. 

* Diod. lib. i. cap. 6. Herod, lib. iii. 

t Herod, lib. ii. 163. 
J Herod, lib. ii. Plut. de Isid. &c. cap. 'J. 



378 CIVIL INSTITUTIONS OF EGYPT. 

" The latter/' says Diodorus, ec being bred up 
from infancy in the practice of rural business, are the 
most skilful agriculturists in the world, and they are 
acquainted with many things unknown elsewhere, 
partly by means of the knowledge gained from their 
ancestors, and partly from their own experience. " If 
any tradesman meddled with public business, or 
attempted to exercise more than one trade, he was 
severely punished. 

The privileged orders in Egypt domineered over 
the productive classes of society. We have seen that 
they shared with the king the entire possession of the 
soil, to which those who cultivated it laid no claim. 
To each individual of the military and sacerdotal 
orders a portion of ground was allotted, equal to 
twelve acres, exempt from all taxes. The warriors 
also enjoyed other privileges. This class was divided 
into two great tribes, called the Calasirians and 
Hermotybians. One thousand men, selected annually 
from each of these bodies, constituted the king's guard; 
and while they were on this service they obtained, 
besides the produce of their allotment in land, an 
allowance of bread, beef, and wine, to each man. It 
was unlawful for any individual of the warrior-caste 
to engage in a mercantile or mechanical occupation.* 
Several of the most fertile and populous districts of 
Egypt belonged to these two tribes : those which 
Were occupied by the Hermotybians furnished, at the 
highest calculation, one hundred and sixty thousand 
men, and the district of the Calasirians two hundred 
fifty thousand. f The reason assigned for allotting 

* Herod, ii. cap. \ 65, ICG. \ Ibid. 






DIVISION OF CASTES. 379 

so large a portion of territory to the military pro- 
fession is, that those who had arms in their hands 
might have a considerable stake in the country, if we 
may venture to use a modern phrase which appears 
to coincide with Egyptian ideas.* It was likewise 
believed by the Egyptians, as by the founders of 
the feudal system in modern Europe, that virtues are 
hereditary, and that fathers who distinguished them- 
selves in defending their country were likely to be 
succeeded by children equally valiant and patriotic. 
Every encouragement was therefore given to the 
increase of the military families, and to promoting 
marriages in this caste.f 



SECTION IL 

Description of the Hierarchy or Hereditary Priesthood, 
and its Subdivisions. 

In no country in the world did the hierarchy ever 
hold more paramount sway than in Egypt. We 
learn, from the faithful pen of the great Hebrew law- 
giver and historian, how soon this order had adopted 
all the vices to which sacerdotal bodies appear to be 
particularly exposed. At the same time they deserve 
commendation for their care in the improvement of 
sciences, and for many wise laws which were enacted 
under their influence. Their greatest crimes were, 
the propagation of a debasing superstition, and the 

* Diodor. Sic. lib. i. cap. 6. t Ibid, 



380 CIVIL INSTITUTIONS. 

concealment of knowledge from the mass of the 
community. 

We shall consider the priesthood of Egypt in their 
three characters : 1. In their political office,, as the 
legal advisers of the kings, and virtual rulers of the 
state. 2. As the depositories of learning and science. 
3. As the officers of religion. 

1 . cc The priests/' says Diodorus, {C were free from 
all public burdens and taxes, and were next to the 
king in authority. " It appears, however, from the 
evidence of the same writer, that all political power 
was in reality in the hands of the priests, and that the 
king was merely an instrument for effecting their 
purposes. <c The first portion of the land of Egypt 
w r as allotted to the priests; the second to the king." 
fi The former were highly reverenced, and had great 
authority over the people, through the influence of their 
piety towards the gods, and their great wisdom and 
learning." * e From their revenues they provided 
sacrifices, and maintained their families." " They 
were always at the king's elbow, as his privy counsellors, 
to instruct and direct him upon all occasions." It 
appears that the king was not allowed to perform any 
action without the superintendance of these consti- 
tutional directors. The sons of the priests were 
his companions from the cradle. Every article of his 
diet was prescribed for him, as well as the hours at 
which he should dispatch public business, and admi- 
nister justice; and the times were fixed when it was 
proper for him to take the air, to bathe, and even to 
perform every trivial action of his life. The means by 
which the priesthood secured the possession of their 
prerogatives was the opinion that they possessed the 



FUNCTIONS OF THE PRIESTHOOD. 381 

knowledge of futurity, and that they were the inter- 
preters of the will of the gods. " They foretold 
events by the help of astrology, and by viewing the 
entrails of victims. " 

It appears, indeed, that in all times of the Egyptian 
monarchy, nothing was more common than the 
elevation of a priest to the throne itself. The laws 
admitted it, and we find among the names of the 
Egyptian kings many that are merely sacerdotal 
titles.* 

Not only political affairs were under the guidance 
of the priests, but the whole system of Egyptian 
jurisprudence or civil administration was in their 
hands. All the laws of this people had been enacted 
by the gods, that is, by the priests who pretended to 
be the interpreters of the will of the gods. Mnevis 
was the most famous legislator ;f Mnevis was also the 
celebrated Bull of Heliopolis ; and these were probably 
the same personage ; but a bull would have made a 
sorry lawgiver,, without the assistance of a sage who 
understood his language and knew how to act the part 
of an interpreter. This bull, Mnevis, seems, as we 
have hinted, to have been the prototype of the Cretan 
Minotaur, and perhaps also of the celebrated Minos. 

But the priests not only made laws, but had also the 
office of watching over their execution, and of con- 
ducting the whole judicial government. iElian informs 
us that the judges had been from all antiquity chosen, 

* Shortly before the reign of Psammitichus, Sethon, a 
priest of Vulcan, was king of Egypt. In the catalogues of 
Manethon and Eratosthenes, we have abundance of names 
which are evidently the titles of priests. 

f Diodor. lib. i. 



382 SUBDIVISIONS OF THE 

in Egypt, from among the priests.* The judges 
wore, as a badge of office, an image made of isapphire, 
and suspended by a gold chain from their necks, 
which represented Truth. f The intention of this 
symbol was to remind them that a judge ought of all 
men to be most upright, human e, and impartial. J 

These important offices were too various and mul- 
tiplied to be exercised by the same individuals ; and it 
appears that the sacerdotal class in Egypt was sub- 
divided into several distinct orders^ who had different 



* JEYmn, Vas. Hist. lib. xiv. cap. 34. 

f Diodor. lib. i. ./Elian, loc. cit. 

% The 'AXyfclx, or image of Truth, has been conjectured by 
some to have been the model of the Urim and Thummim of 
the Mosaic ritual. There is no other foundation for this idea 
than the circumstance that the LXX have interpreted the 
Hebrew Urim, by the Greek word 'AXrfala. This, as Dr. 
Woodward has observed, only proves that the Jews who 
translated the Pentateuch could find nothing more analogous 
in the ideas and phrases of the Egyptian Greeks than this 
term. The only analogy however was, that both the Urim 
and the Egyptian image of Truth were ornaments worn on 
solemn occasions. See Dr. Woodward on the Wisdom of the 
Ancient Egyptians, Archaeology, vol. iv. 

The Urim and Thummim have been the subject of much 
controversy. The most probable opinion respecting them, and 
perhaps the best supported, is that of Michaelis, who supposes 
them to have been a sacred lot, by the use of which doubts were 
resolved, as by an appeal to the Deity. They were used injudicial 
cases to discover the guilty, but not to convict them, for in 
the only two instances which occur of their use in such cases^, 
viz. in Josh. vii. 14, &c. and Sam. xiv. 37, &c. we find the 
confession of the two delinquents annexed. See Michaelis on 
the Mosaic Law, vol. iv. p. 358 of Dr. Smith's translation. 



EGYPTIAN HIERARCHY. 383 

occupations assigned tothem, and held different degrees 
in honour and authority. Several of the^e orders are 
mentioned in a celebrated passage of Clemens of 
Alexandria, which it will be worth while to cite in 
this place.* 

" The Egyptians have a peculiar philosophy of 
their own, of which the order of their religious pro- 
cessions will afford an idea. In these solemn pomps, 
the Singer usually precedes, bearing some musical 
symbol. It is his office to carry two of the books of 
Hermes • one of which contains the hymns of the 
gods, and the other, precepts referring to the duties of 
the king. The singer is followed by the Horoscopus, 
who bears in his hand the measure of time and 
branches of palm, the symbols of astrology; this 
person ought to be perfectly versed in the Hermaic 
books treating of astrology. These books are four in 
number: one of them treats of the disposition of the 
fixed stars ; another of the conjunctions and illumina- 
tions of the sun and moon ; and the remainder of the 
risings of the stars. The Hierograrnmateus cornes 
next, having feathers on his head, and in his hands a 
book and a ruler, with ink and a reed, with which the 
Egyptians write. + It is his province to understand 
the hieroglyphical books, as they are termed, con- 
taining the description of the world, geography, the 
course of the sun and moon, and five planets; he 



* Clem. Alex. Strom, lib. vi. cap. 4. 

f Michaelis has compared the costume of the Hierogram- 
mateus with a description in Ezechiel. See Michaelis, 
on the Mosaic Law, vol. iii. p. 383, English translation 
by Dr. Smith. 

D D D 



384 SUBDIVISIONS OF THE 

must also be acquainted with the description of 
Egypt and the Nile, with the nature of the instru- 
ments, and the places appointed for them, and with 
the measures, and all other things used in the sacred 
rites. After these goes the Stolistes, bearing the staff 
of justice and the cup of libation, who presides over 
all that relates to the education and to the choice of 
victims ; these subjects are distributed in ten books, 
w hich comprehend the honours paid to the gods, and 
the Egyptian worship, the rites of sacrifices, first 
fruits, hymns, prayers, processions, festivals, and 
similar topics.* Last of all comes forth the Prophet, 
bearing the urn of water in his bosom, and followed 
by persons who carry the loaves of bread. The pro- 
phet, who presides over all sacred things is obliged to 
learn the contents of the ten sacerdotal books re- 
lating to the laws, the gods, and the whole discipline 
of the priests. The prophet, also, among the 
Egyptians, overlooks the distribution of the public 
revenues. Thus it appears that there are forty-two 
books attributed to Hermes, which are accounted 
most necessary : thirty-six of these, containing the 
whole philosophy of the Egyptians, are studied by the 
persons above mentioned ; the other six, treating of 
medicine, belong to the Pastophori/'f 

Several of these departments of the hierarchy are 
enumerated by Porphyry, under names but little 
different from those of Clemens. He mentions the 
Prophets, the Hierostolistee, the Hierogram mates, and 

* These books are termed by Clemens, Moschosphagistica, 
or, as we probably should read, Moschosphragistica. 
f Clem. Alex. Strom, lib. vi. p. 633. 



EGYPTIAN HIERARCHY. 385 

even the Horologi, among the higher orders, and the 
Pastophori together with the crowd of Neocori, or 
jEditui, and ministering priests of a lower rank. He 
speaks of the Moscho-sphragistae in another place. 

In the foregoing passages we distinguish the 
following orders : 

1. The Prophets, who seem to have enjoyed the 
first rank in the hierarchy. It appears that they held 
the highest authority in all divine and human affairs : 
they presided over the worship of the gods, the 
administration of laws, and the public revenues. 

2. The Stolistae. The selection of victims, as well 
as the direction of all that related to sacrifices, seems 
to have belonged to them. 

In the order of Stolistae were probably included, as 
a subordinate branch, the Sphragistae, or Moscho- 
sphragistaa, mentioned by Plutarch * and Porphyry, f 
whose duty it was to select victims and impress upon 
them the seal which marked their dedication to the 
purpose of sacrifice. 

3. The Hierogram mates, or sacred scribes, who 
were the depositories of all the learning and science of 
ancient Egypt. The ten books which were appro- 
priated to this order were termed, by distinction, 
hieroglyphical. The sacred scribes are frequently 
mentioned by Josephus in his extracts from Manethon, 
as well as by other writers. J Lucian speaks of one 
of them, who, though the discipline of Hermes had 
long been on the decline, pretended to be well 



* Plutarch de Iside, 31. 

f Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 7- 

X Josepb 3 Epist. ad versus Apion. 



386 SUBDIVISIONS OF THE 

acquainted with all the mystical learning of Egypt, 
having spent twenty-three years in subterranean 
dwellings, where he had been instructed by Isi's in the 
occult sciences.* This appears to have been the 
order of men, who are called Arpedonaptae, or 
Arsepedonaptae, in a passage of Democritus, copied 
by Clemens and by Eusebius.f The philosopher 
boasts that he was a match for the most learned of the 
Egyptian Arpedonaptae, in drawing lines and con- 
structing diagrams. 

4. The Horoscopi, or Horologi, who exercised 
astrology, and probably magic of every description, 
unless we suppose that sorcery belonged to a sepa- 
rate body, not mentioned in this place. 

5. Singers are mentioned as going first in the pro- 
cession ; and it is probable (hat singing and music 
constituted a particular branch of study. They 
chanted hymns to the Sun thrice in each dayj. 

6. The Pastophori were an order of priests fre- 
quently mentioned by the ancient writers. Their title 
seems to be derived, as Mr. Cuper§ has shown, from 
the " ttolg-tqv" or ornamented chamber, tabernacle, 
or shrine, in which the images of the gods were either 
carried about at the processions on the shoulders of 
these priests, or drawn on waggons with four wheels. 
Diodorusll says that the order of iC KripuxEg," or heralds 
at the Eleusinian mysteries, was derived from this 

Egvptian college. From this circumstance, and from 

i 

* Lucian in Philopseude. 

f Clem. Alex. Strom, lib. i. cap. 15, item Euseb. Praep. 
Evangel, 
t Ibid. 
§ Cupels Harpocrates, p. 129, et seqq. || Lib. i. 



EGYPTIAN HIERARCHY. 387 

the nature of their office, it might be supposed that 
they held a low rank in the hierarchy ; and we find 
them mentioned, by Clemens of Alexandria,* among 
the officiating priests of the temples. Porphyry also 
joins with them the Neocori, or iEditui, and the 
priests who performed the lowest offices in the service 
of the gods.f Yet the order of Pastophori is termed 
by Apuleius, " sacrosanctum collegium ;" and a mem- 
ber of this body is described by him as " clothed 
with consecrated linen robes, bearing the thyrsi and 
ivy, and some other badges, which must not be 
named/' 

It appears from the passage before cited from 
Clemens, that the practice of medicine was the lot of 
the Pastophori. In Greece we recognize this order of 
sacerdotal physicians of Egyptian origin, under the 
title of 'loiTpofj.avTsls.'l 

Cuper has treated at length on the office of the 
Pastophori,§ in his learned work on Harpocrates. 

7. Besides the Pastophori, it would appear that 
there were some other inferior orders in the priest- 
hood, corresponding to the Neocori of the Greeks, 
and the iEditui of the Roman temples. They per- 
formed the lowest duties in all the sacred rites and 
ceremonies. 

It appears that these distinctions of office in the 
Egyptian hierarchy were as ancient as the times of 



f Clem. Alex. Paidagog. lib. iii. 

* Porphyr. de Abstinent, lib. iv. cap. 8. 

X zEschyl. Supplic. Mulieres, v. 316. 

§ See Cuper's Harpocrates, p. 132, et seqq. 



388 SUBDIVISIONS OF THE 

the patriarch Joseph, and of Moses. For in Genesis 
and Exodus we meet with several denominations 
which are descriptive of the different orders. The 
priests are called Cohenim, D»jro.* The wise men, or 
Chacamim, D^n, who are termed So^io-raj by the 
LXX, are the persons so celebrated in the history of 
Moses and Aaron. Jablonski supposes these to be the 
sacred scribes ; but this is uncertain: they are men- 
tioned together with the Sorcerers, Mecashphim, 
TOtttoo, or ^oLpfMaxioi, and both seem to be included 
under the term which our translators render Magicians. 
This isCharetummim, tfpanrr. The LXX translate it in 
this place, eirao&oi, Enchanters; in other passages they 
render the same word e%j}yfJTou } or expounders of mys- 
teries.f The performances of these persons seem 
father to agree with the character of the Horoscopi 
than with that of the sacred scribes. The physicians, 
or pastophori, are also distinguished ; and it was 
their duty, as in later times, not only to heal the 
body when sick, but to embalm it after death. J 



* Genesis, xlvi. 20. This word is rendered in the Coptic 
version by the Coptic term P'hont, a high-priest, a word 
which enters into the composition of many ancient Egyptian 
names and titles. Thus Potiphar, or Pentephreh, as this 
name is written by Africanus, means " Priest of the Sun." 

f Herod, lib. ii. cap. 37. 

% Bishop Warburton conjectures that the office of em- 
balming bodies was confided to the physicians with the intent 
of enabling them to make inquiries in morbid anatomy. I fear 
that the claim of this crafty priesthood to such enlightened 
views, rests on no very sure ground. See book iv. sect. 5. of 
the Divine Legation. 



EGYPTIAN HIERARCHY. 389 

It appears further that these various duties were 
hereditary, and that each division of the hierarchy 
formed a distinct caste; for Herodotus informs us 
that the service of every god was confided to a college 
of priests, who were under the superintendance of a 
president, or pontiff, and that this dignity was handed 
down from the father to the son. 



SECTION III. 

Religious Observances of the Sacerdotal Class in Egypt, 

Many of the customs observed by the Sacerdotal 
Class in Egypt are deserving of our attention, not 
only as throwing light on the religious ideas preva- 
lent in that country, but on account of the relation 
they seem to bear either to the institutions of the 
Hebrews or of the Eastern nations. For our know- 
ledge of most of these circumstances we are indebted 
to Plutarch and, more especially, to Porphyry ; who,, 
in the fourth book of his Treatise on Abstinence, has 
described, from the works of Chaeremon, the manner 
of life followed by the Egyptian priests. 

Most of these rites or prohibitions may be referred 
to the idea of purity necessary to be observed by 
the ministers of the gods; though it is sometimes 
difficult to imagine why the articles forbidden were 
supposed to communicate defilement, or how the 
notion of any peculiar sanctity or fitness for religious 
services could be connected with the ordinance. 



390 RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES. 

There were certain times of solemn purification, 
when all the rules of abstinence were more rigidly 
observed than on other occasions. These occurred 
when the priests were preparing for any of the great 
festivals in honour of the gods. It was reckoned 
needful to purify themselves beforehand for the per- 
formance of ceremonies, by observing a peculiar 
degree of solemnity in their manners, and by carefully 
removing every source of defilement. The seasons of 
purification continued sometimes forty-two days, but 
never less than seven, before the religious festivals.* 

1 . All kinds of animal food were forbidden during 
these holy days; and this prohibition extended so far 
that even eggs were included. 

Many of the priests; perhaps some particular sects, 
or those who sought to obtain the character of supe- 
rior sanctity, or to exalt themselves either on earth or 
in a future state, by their good works ; abstained at all 
times from eating the flesh of any living creature. 
Others ate animal food, but under many restrictions 
respecting the particular kinds that might be eaten ; 
and it appears that they only ate those animals which 
were deemed pure or fit for sacrifice. 

The sheep was never eaten by the priests. f The 
hog was accounted particularly unclean, and never 
eaten except at the annual festival of Osiris ; when it 
was sacrificed to that god at the time of the full moon, 
and on that occasion the priests partook of it. J At 
other times it was forbidden to all, except to one 

* See an account of these ayvsTa*, or purifications, in Por- 
phyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv. cap. 6 et J. 

t Plutarch de Isid. et Osir. cap. 8. % Plutarch, 5. 



OF THE SACERDOTAL CLASS. 391 

caste, who fed hogs, and were consequently reckoned 
so impure that they were not permitted to enter the 
temples of the gods.* 

Of the ox-kind the females were never eaten, being 
all sacred to Isis :f of males, such as were twin-born, 
or spotted, or had any variety of form or colour, were 
forbidden to be eaten or sacrificed ; as were also those 
which had been submitted to the yoke, and which 
wanted an eye, or were fancied to bear a resemblance 
to the human countenance. These rules, and a great 
many others, were contained in the books termed 
" Moscho-sphragistica/'J; 

All quadrupeds which had solid hoofs, or hoofs 
many-cleft, were forbidden, as well as those that were 
destitute of horns. || 

All carnivorous birds were unclean, and all fishes, 
because they were supposed to feed upon their own 
kinds. § 

Several vegetable productions were impure, and 
were carefully abstained from, especially in the times 
of purification. All kinds of pulse were at these times 
forbidden ; and it was from the Egyptians that Pytha- 
goras appears to have derived his objection to beans. 
The same restriction extended to most other kinds of 
garden-herbs.! 

All exotics, or the productions of other countries, 
and such as could not be raised in Egypt, were for- 
bidden.** Michaelis supposes this prohibition to have 
originated in a motive of policy, and that its object 

* Herod. 2. Plut. ibid. f Herod. 2. 

X Porphyrius ubi supra. || Porphyrius. 

§ Herod. 2. Plutarch, cap. J. IF Porphyr. ** Ibid. 

E E E 



392 RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES 

was to prevent the importation of articles of luxury 
from foreign countries into Egypt.* This is not 
improbable ; but the prohibition was made under a 
fradulent pretence and confirmed by a religious sanc- 
tion — an instance of priestcraft exerting itself for the 
good of the community. 

Under this head wine and oil were prohibited. 

In the time of Hecatseus and Herodotus the priests 
had a certain allowance of wine ;f but this, as Plutarch 
assures us, was an instance of the laxity introduced 
since intercourse with the Greeks and other foreign- 
ers had become frequent, aud had given rise to various 
innovations on the rigid manners of antiquity. J 
Previously to the reign of Psammitichus, wine had 
been wholly forbidden to the priests ; and the lower 
castes probably had it not in their power to procure 
it. Certainly it was never a common article of diet 
in Egypt. || 

Oil likewise was abstained from, or was taken 
under restrictions, which indicate that its use was 
deemed unlawful. § 

* Michaelis, Mosaisches Recht. f Herod. 

X Plut. de fsid. cap. 8. 

5T In Genesis we read of Pharaoh's butler, and find that the 
king drank the juice of the vine; but it was must, or the unfer- 
mented juice, and not wine, as Michaelis has remarked. See 
Genesis, chap. xl. v. 9 — 13. 

The Egyptians, instead of wine, drank a kind of beer. 
See Herod, lib. ii. iEschylus alludes to this as to a very 
strange custom, and shows that his countrymen regarded 
the Egyptians with contempt for drinking beer, just as the 
English despise the French because they wear wooden shoes. 

§ Porphyry. 



OF THE SACERDOTAL CLASS. 393 

Bread was forbidden during the holy days. At 
other times, when the priests ate it, they beat it up 
with hyssop, which was supposed to purify it from all 
its pernicious or defiling* qualities.* 

Salt was reckoned impure, and was forbidden 
during the times of purification. f 

Hair, wool, or the spontaneous growth of any 
animal, was supposed to communicate defilement. 
Accordingly the priests were forbidden to wear any 
woollen garments. They clothed themselves in linen 
vestments, and wore shoes made of the byblos.t 
They lay on beds woven with the twigs of the palm- 
tree, and used for pillows polished pieces of wood of a 
semi-cylindrical form. || From a similar notion they 
shaved every third day the whole of their bodies. § 
The Egyptian priests are always represented in paint- 
ings and sculptures with shaven heads. It appears, 
however, that this custom was confined to the male 
sex. Female figures are frequently seen in the pomps 
or religious processions depicted in the Egyptian 
temples, having their heads covered with hair.^f 

On some solemn occasions the Egyptians thought 
it necessary to appear with bare feet. In this parti- 
cular they were imitated by the Pythagoreans. " The 
philosopher," said Pythagoras, " who came naked 
from his mother's womb, should appear naked, that 
is, with bare feet, before his god. ,! 



'## 



* Porphyr. f Plutarch, cap. 5. 

% Herod, lib. 2. Plutarch de Isid, cap. 4. 

|| Porphyr. ubi supra. § Herodotus, ubi supra. 

*[ See Montfaucon, Antiquite Explique'e, tom.ii. pi. 286, &c. 

** Demophili Sentential Pythagoreae. Michaelis on the 

Mosaic Law, translated by Dr. Smith, vol. i. p. 485. 



394 RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES 

They affected a particularly solemn gesture, never 
laughed, walked with a demure gait, and at certain 
times refrained from winking their eye-lids.* 

Some of the circumstances supposed to occcasion 
defilement remind us of the legal pollutions of the 
Mosaic law.f 

A person became defiled by contact with a dead 
body, or by merely entering a house where a dead 
body lay. Diogenes Laertius informs us that when 
Pythagoras returned from a funeral or from the house 
of a woman in labour, he took care to undergo certain 
rites of purification. We can scarcely find room to 
doubt that Pythagoras derived this notion from his 
Egyptian instructors. Euripides alludes to similar 
ideas, as prevalent among the worshippers of Diana 
in Greece ;£ and in some verses of the home poet, 
preserved by Porphyry, we find several ideas and 
customs of the Egyptian priesthood ascribed to the 
Idaean Curetes, or priests of Jupiter in Crete. 

ykvzaiv rs Gporcfiu, xou us>cpoSrixr}g 

01) %pifA7TT6fJLSUOg, TY^U TS^O^COU 

" I lead a chaste life, clothed in white garments; 
avoid the approach of a dead body, and the pollu- 
tion incurred by eating the flesh of animals." 
► 

* Porphyr. de Abstin. ubi supra. 

f See the 7th chapter of the fourth book of Porphyry, 
where several of these causes of pollution are enumerated. 
X Eurip. Iphig. inTaurid. v. 380. 
|| Porphyr. lib. iv. cap. 19. 



OP THE SACERDOTAL CLASS. 395 

The Egyptian priests made frequent use of water, 
by way of lustration or purification. Every priest 
was obliged to wash himself with cold water twice in 
the day and twice by night ; or, according to Por- 
phyry, three times in the day — on rising* from bed, 
before the principal meal, and on going to rest.* 

The last custom which I think it worth while to 
notice is the very celebrated rite of circumcision. This 
rite, though some have asserted the contrary, was in 
Egypt confined to the sacerdotal order: it was not 
practised by the mass of the community. Herodotus, 
indeed, in one passage, expresses himself equivocally 
on this subject ;f but in another he restricts circum- 
cision to the children of the priests. J It appears, from 
Josephus's Letter to Apion, that it was not performed 
indiscriminately on all Egyptians, but on comparatively 
a few persons. || Horapollo mentions it as the 
peculiar custom of the sacred order, § and Origen has 
specified the individuals who were required to submit 
to this rite. He says, " Every Egyptian priest, augur, 
or other minister of religion or prophet, undergoes 
circumcision ; neither is any person admitted to 
learn the sacerdotal characters of the old Egyptians, 
unless he shall previously have complied with this 
ordinance."-^ Accordingly we learn that Pythagoras, 
before he could be initiated in the mysterious 
learning of Egypt, was obliged to conform to the 



* Compare Herod, lib. 4. and Porphyr. lib. 4. 

f Herod, lib. ii. cap. 37. X Ibid. lib. ii. cap. 36. 

|| Joseph. Epist. ad Apion. 

§ De Cynocephalo. Horapoll. Hieroglyph. 

% Origen Comment, in Epist. ad Romanos, cap. ii. 13, 



396 OBSERVANCES OF THE PRIESTS. 

established custom. Lastly, in the verses of Anaxart- 
drides, cited from Athenaeus in the former part of this 
work, it is observed that the priests undergo circum- 
cision ; without any notice that it was performed on 
persons of other castes.* 

There was another custom nearly akin to this rite, 
of the precise nature of which we are not imformed. 
Strabo says it was a law among* the Egyptians, (C xaX 
to. SrjXsa sxTspvewS* 

As all the sacred observances of the priesthood 
could be maintained in no other country but Egypt, 
and as by travelling in foreign lands an Egyptian 
would necessarily expose himself to numberless 
pollutions, it was reckoned one of the most impious 
of actions to embark and go by sea to any distant 
country. This was only permitted to those who were 
sent with a royal commission to transact some public 
business.f 

* Vide supra, p. 21. 

t Porphyr. ubi supra. 

This prejudice exists in the same degree among the Brah-' 
mans of India. Indeed, the whole tenor of the system of 
observances we have been surveying is in strict conformity 
with the prejudices of the Hindoos. We cannot trace every 
particular custom among them ; but it is evident that similar 
habits of thought, and the same fundamental principles, 
modified by various circumstances, have displayed their effect 
on both of these nations. 



NOTE 

ON 

BOOK IV. CHAPTER HI. 

It is curious to observe the very permanent effect produced 
on the state of human society by the institution of hereditary 
castes. We have already hinted at a fact which furnishes a 
proof and illustration of this remark; that is, the agreement 
between the present civil condition of the Hindoos, and the 
description given of the same nation by Megasthenes, who 
visited their country nearly three centuries before the Christian 
era. But a still more striking circumstance is the coincidence 
between the customs of the Egyptians as described by 
ancient historians, and the habits of the Hindoos, as exhibited 
in their present state and laid down in the code of their law- 
giver Menu. It will not be departing too widely from our 
subject to make this comparison. 

Megasthenes accompanied the Macedonian conqueror into 
India, in the course of which expedition he had an opportu- 
nity of surveying the Punjab. He was afterwards sent by 
ISeleucus on a mission to the king of the Prasii, and resided 
some time at the court of Palibothra. He had therefore on the 
whole a sufficient opportunity of becoming acquainted with 
the customs of the Indians. His original account has not 
descended to our days; but it is probable that the chief part 
of the information it contained has been preserved by Arrian, 
Strabo, and Diodorus. The accounts indeed which these 
writers have transmitted of the Indian tribes on the authority 
of Megasthenes, agree so closely among themselves, as to in- 
dicate that they have been extracted with little alteration from 
the original work. Arrian is the most minute and circumstan- 
tial in his description ; but Strabo and Diodorus have recorded 
some particulars which he has omitted. 



398 COMPARISON OF THE EGYPTIAN 

The following is a translation of those passages in Arrian's 
Indica which contain his account of the Indian classes or 
tribes ; with the additions of some circumstances which he has 
omitted, from the works of other compilers, who derived their 
information from the same source. 

" The whole Indian nation," says Arrian, " is divided into 
seven principal tribes. One of these consists of the Wise Men, 
who are inferior to the other tribes in number, but the most 
elevated in rank and public esteem. For they are neither 
obliged to perform any bodily labour, nor to contribute from 
the produce of their exertions to the public revenue. In short, 
the Wise Men have no other duty imposed upon them than 
that of celebrating the sacrifices to the gods in behalf of the 
Indian commonwealth; it is likewise ordained that, if any 
individual makes an offering in private, he must be assisted by 
one of the Wise Men, as superintendant of the sacred rites, 
the sacrifice not being supposed, without such a precaution, to 
be pleasing to the gods. These persons, out of the whole 
Indian people, are alone skilled in the art of prophecy, nor is 
the exercise of it permitted to any other individuals. They 
prophecy concerning the seasons, and anticipate any public 
calamities that are about to befal the nation, but cannot so 
exert their skill respecting the private affairs of individuals, 
whether because they imagine that the power of augury does 
not extend to minute particulars, or deem such matters 
unworthy of their time and labour." 

Arrian further observes, that the Wise Men go naked and 
live in the open air, taking shelter from the heat of the sun in 
the summer, under a kind of large trees, one of which seen by 
Nearchus, was so extensive that its shadow covered five acres 
of ground, and was of sufficient space to protect ten thousand 
persons from the solar rays.* He adds, that their sustenance 
consists of fruits and vegetable matters. 

Diodorus terms this tribe " Philosophers." He says iC they 
preside over funerals, as being acquainted with the affairs of 

* These are doubtless the Banyan trees. 



AND INDIAN CLASSES. 399 

the nether regions, for which service they receive considerable 
rewards and honours." In other particulars, this author agrees 
in the substance of his description with Arriam 

" The sixth tribe of Indians," whom we shall mention in the 
second place, for reasons that will presently appear, " are those 
called Episcopi or Overseers : they inspect whatever is going 
on in the country and in the cities, and give information to 
the king in places where a monarchical government is esta- 
blished, or to the magistrates in independent cities. It is 
reckoned criminal for them to make any false report, nor has 
any accusation of this description been brought against them." 

The seventh tribe are persons who consult with the king on 
public affairs, or with the magistrates in independent states. 
The number of this class is small; but for wisdom and inte- 
grity they are the most distinguished. From this body are 
selected the magistrates, including governors of districts, de- 
puty governors, treasurers, commanders of troops and of ships, 
store-keepers, and the superintendants of rustic affairs. 

These three tribes are evidently subdivisions of the great 
Brahman caste, certain families of which follow secular 
employments. How accurately this description of Megasthenes 
agrees with modern usages will be evident from the following 
observations. 

The proper office of a Brahman is meditation on divine 
things, and his proper mode of subsistence is by begging. But 
owing to the corruptions of these latter times, many of the 
noble caste are obliged to betake themselves to what they 
consider as unworthy occupations, " such as being governors 
and judges of cities, collectors of revenue, and accountants; 
nay, some even condescend to cultivate the earth by means of 
slaves." Hence, as Dr. F. Buchanan observes, " arises the 
distinction of Brahmans into Vaidika and Lokika. The diver- 
sity of employment does not create an absolute distinction of 
castes. The daughter of a Vaidika may marry a Lokika, or 
the son of a Lokika betake himself to the occupation of a 
Vaidika; but such instances are uncommon, especially of the 
latter case, in which the new Vaidika is always looked upon as 

FFF 



400 COMPARISON OP THE EGYPTIAN 

of ignoble birth, and the family is not considered as pure till 
after several generations, devoted to study and mortification." 

The description of the sixth and seventh classes from Arrian 
proves that these were divisions of the Lokika Brahmans. 
The latter agrees remarkably with the following account of a 
set of officers known in Southern India, under the name of 
Tahsildars. 

u The duty of the Tahsildar," says Dr. Buchanan, " is to 
travel through the districts, inspecting the conduct of the 
village officers, so as to prevent them from oppressing the 
farmers, and from cultivating any ground except that which 
pays rent. He superintends the repairs of tanks and canals, 
receives the rents from village officers, and transmits them 
with care to the general treasury. He acts as civil magistrate 
in the first instance, deciding all causes ; but in every case 
there is an appeal to the collector. As officer of the police he 
takes up all criminals, and, having examined witnesses, sends 
an account of the proceedings to the collector, who either 
orders punishment, or, if not satisfied, personally investigates 
the matter." 

The account of the Brahmans of Malabar by Mr. Forbes 
so strikingly agrees with the description of Arrian, that I 
cannot forbear citing the following passages. 

" The Malabar Brahmans, like those in other parts of India, 
form two distinct classes, engaged in different pursuits. Both 
are held sacred by the other castes. One has the absolute and 
entire management of every thing relating to religion ; occu- 
pied by no secular concerns, they spend their days under the 
sacred groves of their temples, in superstitious ceremonies or 
listless indolence, or study the sacred volumes, treatises on 
astrology, medicine, or fabulous legends. They inculcate 
benevolence to man, and kindness to the animal creation ; and 
are reverenced by the inferior tribes, who swear by their heads, 
and treat them with filial affection. " 

The Brahmans who live in large towns, and hold situations 
under their respective princes as officers of government, col- 
lectors of the revenues, and in other political departments, do 



AND INDIAN CLASSES. 401 

not merit this amiable character. They may, on the contrary, 
be classed with the despots so often mentioned, who unfeel- 
ingly exercised the rod of oppression over the lives and property 
of their fellow-creatures ; although, by a strange inconsistency, 
these very persons are taught to shudder at the death of an 
insect, and tremble at the idea of inhaling an animalcule.* 

There is still another division of the Brahmans who deserve 
notice. These are the caste called Numbi, who officiate in 
the temples of Vishnu and Siva ; and they are considered so 
far below the Lokika and Vaidika in dignity, that even the 
meanest of the Vaidika Brahmans will not intermarry with the 
family of a Numbi. 

The Gurus are hereditary presidents of temples. The 
Purohitas are the family priests, whose business it is to perform 
sacrifices in houses, and assist at the private devotions of the 
Hindoos, as above noticed by Arrian. 

Such is the description of the noble caste of Brahmans at 
the present day, and such was its description two thousand 
years ago, and, as we may presume, at a much earlier period ; 
since it is otherwise impossible to account for the agreement 
between the constitution of the Indian and Egyptian hierar- 
chies. It is almost superfluous to observe, that there is scarcely 
any trait in the outline we have now drawn which does not 
apply almost as precisely to the one as to the other. The 
same offices were allotted to the sacerdotal class in Egypt as in 
India. The subdivisions of the class, and the distribution of 
duties to the different orders, were the same; and, lastly, their 
separate offices were transmitted, in both countries, in parti- 
cular families. The Guru, in India, is succeeded by his son, 
as was the president of each college in Egypt. The Purohita 
has the same duties which, in the law of Moses, are allotted to 
a particular class of Levites. It is probable, for reasons which 
will presently appear, that the institution of Moses agreed in 
this circumstance with the customs of Egypt. 

We shall now extract from Arrian's works his account of 
the other Indian classes. 

* Forbes's Oriental Memoirs, vol. i. p. 370'. 



402 COMPARISON OF THE EGYPTIAN 

The Military Class, which Megasthenes termed the fifth 
tribe of Indians, were, according to that writer, next in number 
to the agricultural class. u They enjoy the greatest share of 
liberty, and are the most lively and energetic of the whole 
nation. Arms are prepared for them, and a supply of horses 
procured by others; and they are served in all the drudgery of 
the camp by persons who take care of their horses, clean their 
arms, load their elephants, and harness and drive their chariots. 
But the men of this tribe carry on war as long as it is 
necessary, and, when peace is concluded, spend their lives in 
peace and affluence." 

" The Agricultural Tribe, mentioned by Megasthenes in 
the second place, is the most numerous of all the Indian castes. 
They neither possess any military implements, nor have any 
concern with the affairs of war; but cultivate the soil, and pay 
tribute to the kings or to the magistrates of independent com- 
munities. If any intestine wars break out among the Indians, 
it is unlawful for any person to interfere with the operations 
of the husbandman, or to lay waste the land ; but the others 
fight and slay their enemies as they find opportunity, while 
the rustics, undisturbed, plough the land in their presence, and 
collect their vintage, and wood, and their harvests. ' Hence,' 
says Diodorus, c the soil brings forth abundant crops, never 
suffering from the ravages of war. The rustics dwell in the 
country with their wives and children, and entirely abstain 
from intercourse with cities ; and they pay a rent to the kings 
for their estates, all India being royal property, and no private 
individual having the right to possess land. The rent is a 
fourth part of the produce, which is paid into the royal 
treasury.' " 

" Another tribe consists of artisans and petty traders, and of 
persons who live by bodily labour. Of these some pay tribute 
and perform stated works, make arms and build ships; for 
which they receive stipends." " Of this tribe are the ship- 
builders and the sailors who navigate the rivers. 

" The two last-mentioned tribes include the various divisions 
of the Vaisya and Sudra classes; though not accurately 
distinguished. 



AND INDIAN CLASSES. 403 

u A seventh tribe is mentioned, consisting of mountaineers ; 
who were wandering herdsmen and hunters. 

"Intermarriages between different tribes are forbidden, except 
between the agriculturists and the artisans." These divisions, 
we may remark, belong, in the political code of India, to one 
great class. " Neither is it lawful to pass from one profession 
to another, nor for the same individual to follow more than 
one, unless for one of the sacerdotal class, who are permitted 
to do so on account of their superior mental endowments." 

I shall conclude these remarks on the Hindoo castes with 
the following passage from Menu's Institutes, which discri- 
minates the duties of the four great divisions of the people, 
and bears as near a relation to the economy of the Egyptians 
as to the customs of the Hindoos themselves. 

" For the sake of preserving this universe, the Being 
supremely glorious allotted separate duties to those who 
sprang respectively from his mouth, his arm, his thigh, and 
his foot. 

" To the Brahmans he assigned the duties of reading the 
Veda, of teaching it, of sacrificing, of assisting others to 
sacrifice, of giving alms, if they be rich ; and, if indigent, of 
receiving gifts. 

" To defend the people, to give alms, to sacrifice, to read 
the Veda, to shun the allurements of sensual gratification, 
are, in a few words, the duties of a Cshatriya. 

" To keep herds of cattle, to bestow largesses, to sacrifice, 
to read the Scripture, to carry on trade, to lend at interest, 
and to cultivate land, are prescribed or permitted to a Vaisya. 

" One principal duty the Supreme Rahe assigned to a 
Sudra, namely, to serve the before-mentioned classes, without 
depreciating their worth." 

I shall not enter into any further details respecting the cus- 
toms of particular castes. Enough has been said to show the 
relation they bear in the chief points to those of Egypt. 

The same abstinences, the same attention to ablutions, and 
similar ideas respecting the circumstances entailing pollution, 
©r legal defilement, are found in the histories of both nations. 



404 EGYPTIAN AND INDIAN CLASSES. 

And the Brahmans, like the old Egyptian priests, are forbidden 
from quitting their native country, and exposing themselves in 
foreign lands to unavoidable irregularities. Even those indivi- 
duals of this exalted caste, who have visited the courts of foreign 
princes as ambassadors from their native sovereign, have been 
compelled to go through a ceremony, typical of regeneration, 
before they could be looked upon as absolved from the pollu- 
tions contracted in passing through impure regions, and be 
restored to the privileges of their caste.* 

* See Forbes's Oriental Memoirs, vol. i. p. 379 j where there 
are some curious remarks on this subject. 



CHAPTER IV. 

COMPARISON OF THE MOSAIC ORDINANCES WITH THE 
LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF THE EGYPTIANS. 



SECTION I. 

Introduction. 

It has often been remarked, that various parts of the 
Mosaic law bear a certain resemblance to some of 
the ordinances observed by the Egyptian priesthood. 
This analogy has been accounted for in very opposite 
ways. Some writers have peremptorily asserted that 
Moses was a mere imitator of pagan institutions : 
others have determined, without sufficient support 
from historical testimony, and with very little pro- 
bability, that the Egyptians copied the ordinances of 
the Hebrew lawgiver. 

This subject has been amply discussed by well- 
known authors, and most of the facts which bear 
any relation to it have been cited and compared. ^ 
should therefore willingly avoid entering into it. 
Some observations, however, have occasionally sug- 
gested themselves in the foregoing pages, the ten- 
dency of which might be misapprehended, if they were 
suffered to appear without any further comment. I 
am induced by this, and partly by some other motives, 



406 COMPARISON OF THE MOSAIC RITES. 

to offer the following general remarks on those 
relations between the Hebrew and Egyptian ordi- 
nances, which have so often excited the attention of 
divines and antiquarians. I shall confine myself, 
for obvious reasons, to a general survey, and refer 
for particular illustrations to the authors who have 
expressly treated on the several divisions of this 
subject. 

I purpose to compare the Mosaic institutions with 
those of Egypt, under three different relations : first, 
with respect to theology, or religious doctrine; 
secondly, with reference to social and political regu- 
lations ; and thirdly, with respect to rites and 
ceremonies, and all the external performances of 
religious and sacerdotal discipline. 



SECTION II. 

Theological Doctrine of Moses compared with that of the 
Egyptians. 

With respect to theology, no two systems can be 
more directly opposed to each other than the Mosaic 
doctrine was to that of the Egyptians. The latter, 
as we have seen, personified the elements, and the 
physical powers, whose agency is the most striking in 
the operations of nature; and their theological fables, 
when closely examined, amounted to little more than 
figurative or fanciful descriptions of the phaenomena 
of the material world, or the causes that were supposed 
to give rise to them. Worship was paid by them in 



WITH THE EGYPTIAN. 407 

its turn, to almost every object that revolves in 
the heavens, and to every creature which is pos- 
sessed of locomotive powers on the earth. The 
Mosaic law, as we well know, directed the severest 
denunciations against every species of idolatry, and 
ordained the worship of the One Invisible God. It is 
true that the Egyptians recognised, among their 
esoteric or philosophical doctrines, the existence of a 
spiritual and eternal being ; but this tenet was 
carefully concealed from the people, instead of 
becoming the foundation and most conspicuous part 
of the popular religion ; it was also disfigured, in the 
representations of the Egyptians, by fanciful conceits, 
which destroyed its simplicity and sublime effect ; 
and it was combined with superstitious notions which, 
in a great measure, deprived it of its force as a sanc- 
tion of morality. 

It may, indeed, be objected that the Egyptian 
religion perhaps acquired most of its corruptions at 
an era subsequent to that of Moses. It may therefore 
have presented a very different aspect, in the days 
of the Hebrew lawgiver, from that which we have 
collected from the testimony of much later times. 
But if the Egyptians retained, in any great measure, 
the simple faith of the patriarchs, at the epoch to 
which we refer, we have still stronger reasons for be- 
lieving that it was preserved in a state not less genuine 
among those pastoral nations, the simple and un- 
varied tenour of whose existence precludes all great 
innovations in manners and sentiments. 

We must therefore conclude that in promulgating 
that great and conspicuous tenet which Moses con- 
tinually displays as the end and principal aim of aU 

G G G 



408 CIVIL ORDINANCES OF THE 

his regulations, he was neither guided by the lessons 
nor influenced by the examples of his Egyptian 
instructors. 



SECTION III. 

Political and Civil Institutions of Moses, compared with those 
of the Egyptians. 

In the political and civil constitution founded by 
Moses, we find some instances of agreement with 
the Egyptian polity, and others of remarkable contra- 
distinction. 

In the most striking feature in the whole system of 
civil regulations, the plan adopted by the Hebrew 
lawgiver stands in direct opposition to the polity of the 
Egyptians. The founders of the latter had made it their 
chief endeavour to depress the mass of the community, 
in order to pamper the luxury and pride of the dis- 
tinguished orders. Hence the complicated system of 
subordinate ranks, which consigned the lower castes, 
with their posterity, to a state of perpetual servility 
and abject degradation. 

The system of society established by Moses was, 
on the contrary, one of perfect equality,* not the 

* In the appointment of the Gibeonites to be " hewers of 
wood and drawers of water," there is something like the 
formation of a low caste, degraded to perpetual servility. 
But this was the result of an accidental combination of cir- 
cumstances, which took place during the conquest of Palestine 
by Joshua; and no provision for it, or anticipation of it, is to be 
found in the law. Moses is in no way answerable for it. 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 409 

casual result of circumstances, but the object which 
the founder purposely contrived a great part of his 
civil institutions to uphold. Hence, the regulations 
for maintaining equal possessions, as far as this was 
possible,, by apportioning to each family a certain 
extent of land, and precluding by express laws the 
permanent alienation of estates. 

In one remarkable circumstance the constitution 
founded by Moses resembles the Egyptian : this 
is the consecration of a particular race or family 
to the offices of religion, and to some civil duties that 
were more or less closely associated with them. 
The Levitical priesthood corresponds in many parti- 
culars with the hereditary hierarchy of the Egyptians ; 
yet there is one characteristic trait which distin- 
guishes the designs that severally directed the 
founders of these orders. In Egypt the priests, 
besides innumerable privileges and immunities, 
claimed a real property in one third part of the whole 
territory : the temporal splendour and opulence of 
this body was the object chiefly aimed at. The 
Mosaic priesthood,, though equally elevated in dignity 
and office, was expressly excluded from territorial 
possessions, and was rendered dependant for support 
on certain revenues connected with its civil and 
religious duties. 

The various offices, both civil and religious, 
allotted by Moses to the Levites, were similar to those 
which belonged to the hierarchy in Egypt. 

There is only one striking exception that can be 
made to this remark. The prophets of the Egyptians 
were an order in the hereditary priesthood ; the pro- 
phets of the Hebrews were men raised up from any 



410 CIVIL ORDINANCES OF THE 

tribe, without distinction, and the most illustrious 
were not descended from Levi. 

1. The high-priesthood itself was hereditary in a 
particular house ; so was the pontificate of each par- 
ticular god in Egypt. 

2. The judicial office belonged to the Levites, as 
it did in Egypt to the priests. The chief magistrates, 
called Sophtim, or SufFetes, who succeeded Joshua, 
were chiefly military commanders, and sprang from 
various tribes; but the details of justice, and the 
settling of controversies, are expressly set apart, by 
Moses, as functions belonging to the Levites; and we 
find that they continued to be vested in the same body.* 
Thus, in the reign of David, six thousand Levites 
were employed as judges and scribes. 

S. The Shoterim or Scribes were generally of the 
tribe of Levi.f Their office corresponds exactly 
with that of the Hierogram mates in Egypt. They 
were public accountants, managed records, kept 
registers, and were the depositories of all the litera- 
ture and science of the Hebrews. J 

4. Medicine, like other parts of knowledge, seems 
to have belonged to the priests in Palestine, as in 
Egypt ; at least, the diagnosis of leprosy was assigned 
to them, as well as the regulations of medical police. 

The concession that this part of the Mosaic con- 
stitution was formed on the model of an Egyptian 

* Deuteron. xxi. 5. See Michaelis on the Mosaic Law, Dr. 
Smith's translation, vol. i. p. 258, et seqq, 

f Michaelis, ibid. 

J When David distributed to each Levite his office, he 
appointed some to superintend weights and measures. I 
Chron. xxiii. 29. 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 411 

ordinance may be thought derogatory to the sacred 
character of the Hebrew lawgiver. Yet, when we 
consider how powerful an instrument the Egyptian 
hierarchy has proved itself to be, in preserving and 
maintaining the superstition confided to it ; how well 
adapted such an hereditary priesthood evidently was 
to the condition of society, in the times to which we 
are referring; it seems to be a proof of the highest 
wisdom, and of a truly enlightened policy, to employ 
the power of such an agent for the defence of true 
religion. 

If there is any part of the public ordinances of 
Egypt, of which we might expect to find Moses a mere 
copyist or servile imitator, it is the system of criminal 
and civil laws, and the regulations that refer to morals 
and social life. It is in these relations that the laws of 
the Egyptians have been most applauded. Their 
theology, as we have seen, contained a variety of 
extravagant conceits, and preserved in a very imper- 
fect state even the first principles of natural religion ; 
their political constitution degraded'the mass of the 
people into a most servile condition, and sacrificed 
them to the interests of the privileged orders ; their 
rites and customs were, in many instances, detestable. 
But the civil regulations, and the moral code of this 
nation, have been the theme of loud applause among 
the greatest writers of antiquity, and their fame has 
often been re-echoed in modern times. It is on this 
side, then, that we might expect, with the greatest 
probability,, to find an agreement between the laws 
of Moses and the Egyptians. A legislator who had 

* See Michaelis on the Mosaic Law. 



412 CIVIL ORDINANCES OF THE 

been taught by the priests of Heliopolis may be 
supposed likely to display in his work the lessons of 
his instructors, and especially to have copied those 
parts of their system which the wise men of old times 
were so prone to admire and celebrate. We look, 
however, in vain for any mark of consent between 
the morality of Moses and that of his predecessors. 

In the first place, we may observe that-there was a 
wide difference in the spirit of the Hebrew and Egyp- 
tian laws, if we regard the sanctions by which their 
authority was confirmed. The Egyptian priests 
denounced the miseries of a future life and of penal 
transmigrations, against those who violated their 
ordinances. Moses had declared, in the outset, that 
God had promised to govern Israel as its immediate 
sovereign, with temporal rewards and punishments. 
Accordingly, he has made no reference in his laws to 
the dispensations of the invisible world. The exam- 
ples which the present life affords are far more 
impressive than future expectations, especially in a 
semi-barbarous and unreflecting age, and the doctrine 
of the soul has often been, in the East, a source of 
endless superstitions. We know that the Rabbins in 
later times adopted the psychology of the Egyptians, 
and with it all the absurd tenets with which it was 
connected. Moses, in thus appealing to the general 
experience of the divine justice, has given a strong 
proof of his sincerity and confidence ; at the same 
time he has displayed true wisdom, in refusing such 
methods of influencing the minds of men as were 
most popular in his age, but have proved themselves 
to be, under the existing circumstances, unavailable, 
and the sources of gross and pernicious delusions. 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 413 

In the penal inflictions with which both parties 
found it necessary to aid the impressions of religion, 
we observe a wide difference between them. The 
penal code of the Egyptians, according to Diodorus, 
consisted for the most part in a variety of mutilations : 
the member of the body supposed to be chiefly 
in fault was cut off, as the punishment of most 
offences.* " Severe tortures were had recourse to in 
other cases, and some horrible and disgusting 
sufferings were inflicted, as in the instances of child- 
murder and parricide. f In the penal code of Moses, 
we find no mention of bodily mutilations, or of 
tortures, excepting a limited number of stripes : 
and capital punishments, though numerous, were 
summary and immediate. 

3. In the criminal code of Moses a variety of 
actions are enumerated as offences, and even ordered 



* Persons convicted of treasonable communication with an 
enemy had their tongues cut out ; persons guilty of forgery, 
or similar offences, had both their hands cut off. " Qui foeminas 
libera^ vim obtulerant membri cujusdam amputationem passi 
sunt." Diodor. Hist. lib. i. cap. 6. 

f Infanticide was punished by obliging the parents to hug 
their dead children in their arms for three successive days and 
nights. This if true, gives countenance to the idea sug- 
gested by Warburton, that infanticide was commonly practised 
in Egypt, in the time of Moses. The account of the Egyptian 
midwives in Exodus indicates, as the Bishop observes, that 
the office they were employed in was not altogether foreign 
to the rational customs. So strange a punishment as that 
above mentioned would scarcely have been appointed, if the 
crime had not been frequently practised and tolerated in the? 
preceding times. 



414 CIVIL ORDINANCES OF THE 

to be punished with death, which in Egypt were 
encouraged by religious rites and the example of the 
gods, and adopted in common practice. Sensuality 
of the most flagitious description, was tolerated and 
encouraged in Egypt ; and it would appear as if no 
species of debauchery entered into the catalogue of 
crimes in (hat country. Offences of this class were, 
as we well know, strictly forbidden by Moses, under 
the severest penalties.* 

In the regulations that refer to matrimonial con- 
nections and the domestic relations of life, men are 
wont more than in any other matters to follow 
established customs and prejudices: if, therefore, 
Moses had been inclined to form the manners of his 
people on those of the nation among whom he had 
been educated, he certainly would not have innovated 
in that respect. It is well known that in all these 
points his laws are directly opposed to the Egyptian 
customs. f 

The following is the preface to the laws respecting 
marriages in the Mosaic code. " After the doings of 
the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwell, shall ye not do." 
— " Ye shall do my judgments, and observe mine 
ordinances to walk therein: I am Jehovah, your 
God."* 

* Moses was obliged so far to condescend to the customs of 
a barbarous age, as to tolerate polygamy. His regulations 
tended, however, in a very important manner, as Michaelis 
has shown, to discourage it in practice. 

f Marriages between persons near of kin were in frequent 
practice in Egypt, and were sanctioned by the example of the 
gods. 

J Leviticus, chap, xviii. 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 415 

There is another trait which has been remarked as 
distinguishing the morality of the Mosaic institutions 
from that of the Egyptians. In the code of these 
learned pagans, there were many salutary regulations, 
but the best of them were disgraced by impostures, 
and those deceptions which are termed pious frauds : 
priestcraft displays itself on every side. In the law of 
Moses we discover a strict adherence to good faith : 
no false pretences are made use of as motives to lead 
to useful courses of action. 

The fondness for secrecy, and for enveloping truths 
or opinions in a cloak of mystery, is another trait of 
Egyptian priestcraft. Hence the celebrated distinc- 
tion of Esoteric and Exoteric philosophy, invented by 
the Egyptians, and afterwards imitated by many of 
the Greeks. It was, perhaps, with a view to secrecy 
that the Egyptians retained the use of hieroglyphic 
or symbolic characters, after the alphabetic mode of 
writing had become well known. It answered their 
purpose : it concealed from vulgar curiosity the 
wonders of their learning and superstition, as it has 
perhaps for ever veiled their ignorance from the 
irreverent scrutiny of posterity. 

Moses repudiated every thing that favoured 
mystery and concealment; and he laid aside the 
hieroglyphic writing, with which he must have been 
acquainted, for the alphabetic characters, of which it 
is easy for the common people to avail themselves. 



H H H 



416 CEREMONIAL LAWS OF THE 



SECTION IV. 

Comparison of the Ceremonial Law of Moses with that 
of the Egyptians. 

It remains for us to compare the institutions of 
Moses and those of the Egyptians, with reference to 
the external ceremonies of religion and sacerdotal 
discipline. It cannot be denied that there were 
several features of resemblance between the Mosaic 
and Egyptian rituals, which must have originated in 
some other source than accidental coincidence. Yet 
a very superficial survey of the subject will suffice to 
prove, that the Hebrew legislator was not, in this part 
of his code, a mere copyist of Egyptian ordinances: 
But, before we enter on this consideration, it may be 
proper to pause, and inquire whether it is not certain, 
from the nature of circumstances, that a system of 
rites and ceremonies, instituted at any period of the 
world, must display traces of such modes of thinking 
and acting as previously prevailed. As all ceremonies 
derive their power and utility from the ideas and 
sentiments which they excite in the beholders, and as 
these ideas and sentiments depend upon the influence 
of previous habits and prejudices, the promulgator 
of a ritual law, whether he be guided by divine or 
by human intelligence, must necessarily raise his 
superstructure on the foundations that are prepared 
for him. A wise lawgiver would be led to adopt and 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 41? 

establish^ by a new sanction, such practices as were 
associated, either by a natural allusion or by habit, 
with feelings of reverence, or which expressed, in a 
striking and impressive manner, true ideas respecting 
the relations of man to a higher power, and tended to 
excite sentiments of piety, humanity, and moral purity, 
in the minds of the beholders. To reject such unex- 
ceptionable instruments, and to attempt to govern 
the opinions and sentiments of men by a system of 
machinery which had no hold on the habits and 
characters of the people whom it was designed to 
controul and edify, would betray a total ignorance of 
the constitution of the human mind. The project 
would be utterly absurd. 

These reflections mav suffice to show that we must 
not expect to find in the ceremonial laws of Moses, a 
system of rites entirely new, and bearing no traces of 
customs and ordinances previously existing. 

In proceeding to this comparison, we may first 
observe that all those rites and customs of the Egyp- 
tians which were an offence against nature or good 
morals were expressly proscribed by Moses. Among 
these we may reckon human sacrifices, the abomi- 
nations of the temple of Mendes, and many other 
excesses connected with the idolatrous worship of this 
people. 

By some other prohibitions, Moses seems to have 
aimed at distinguishing his priesthood and the people 
subjected to their influence from the Egyptians. Such 
would appear to have been the intent of the law which 
forbade the cutting off the hair of a priest,* and of that 

* Ezechielj xliv. 20. Spencer de Legg. Hebrteor. cap. xxv. 
sect. 2. 



418 CEREMONIAL LAWS OF THE 

which prohibited the planting of trees near the altar 
of Jehovah ■ of the injunction to sacrifice heifers 
instead of bulls and male calves.* In all these par- 
ticular and in many others, the observances ordained 
by Moses were in direct contradistinction to the 
customs of Egypt. 

I shall now proceed to enumerate the most remark- 
able examples of resemblance and agreement between 
the Hebrew rites and the customs of the Egyptians 
and other Pagan nations. 

I. In the rites of lustration, or purification by water, 
there is an instance of such agreement. But this may 
be thought an accidental coincidence. The ceremony 
of cleansing the person by ablution affords so natural 
and obvious a type of inward or mental purification ,,f 
that nothing is more probable than that different 
nations may have adopted it without interchange 
of ideas, 

But although the use of ablutions in the ceremonial 

* Numbers xix. 5. Spencer de Legg. lib. ii. cap. 15. 
sect. 2. 

f It is obvions that a ceremony of tin's description, at first 
merely typical, must have preceded and given origin to the 
popular notion, that ablution in consecrated streams or foun- 
tains had the power of actually removing guilt, or mental 
defilement, together with external impurity. Such a notion 
can only have been the result of a ceremony previously esta- 
blished : it cannot be imagined to have furnished in the first 
place the motive for instituting the rite, or the design with 
which it was contrived. The heathen writers had a clear con- 
ception of the inefficacy of ablution in the latter sense. 

" Ah nimiilm faciles, qui tristia crimina ccedis 
Tolli fluminea posse putatis aqua.'* 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 419 

of religion is not of itself sufficient to prove inter- 
course between the nations who have practised it, 
the manner of performing it may determine whether 
it has been adopted casually, as a natural and obvious 
emblem, or was derived by one nation from another, 
by imitation. Spencer has pointed out so many 
circumstances in the ablutions ordained in the Leviti- 
cal law, which resemble the rites of several nations 
who had their religious ceremonies in common with 
the Egyptians, that we can scarcely refuse our assent 
to the inference he deduces. His conclusion is, that 
Moses adopted this rite from the usages of antiquity. 

We shall briefly notice some circumstances in the 
heathen lustrations which bear a strong analogy to 
the Mosaic ordinances. 

Before prayers were addressed to the gods, it was 
necessary for the supplicant to purify himself by 
washing his hands. 

Mrjos 7tot !£ Tfiug Au XJfbeiy a!Qo7ra, otvov 

-ysp<r\v avi7TT0i(ri'J, jU/yjS' aKhoig olSolvoltoiciv. 

******* 

M.7}$s 7tot aevacou 7rora^uo«y xaTuppoov ufiwp 
7roo-o"} 7rspaV, 7rph y tvfzj) 

eu%£i 3 )%a)V slg KoCha. pisSpct 
■yiipa.$ vi-tyoLfxzvog 7ro7<vripoLTip v^olti "Ksuxcp* 

Purification from legal defilements was performed 
in many instances by aspersion. The instrument 
used in the Levitical ceremony was a branch of 
hyssop ; in the Pagan rites, a branch of laurel or palm. 

" Spargit et ipse suos lauro rorante capillos 
Incipit et solita fundere voce preces.f 

* Hesiod. Op. et Dies. v. 355. f Ovid. Fastor. lib. v. 



420 CEREMONIAL LAWS OF THE 

<e He sprinkles his hair with the branch of laurel, 
dropping dew, and begins to utter his accustomed 
orisons.' ' 

In other circumstances, connected with the lustral 
ceremonies, Spencer has pointed out coincidences 
between the Mosaic and Egyptian laws.* 

2. The custom of offering animals in sacrifice 
has been considered as an example of coincidence in 
the practices of these two nations. No inference 
however can be drawn from finding a rite of this 
description established in two particular countries. 
The universal prevalence of sacrifices over the 
ancient world proves that this rite had its origin at 
an era antecedent to the division of mankind into 
separate families. 

The sacrifices of the Egyptians were expiatory or 
vicarious offerings. Such were the offerings of the 
Hebrews. But we cannot conclude from this circum- 
stance that one people derived the practice from the 
other, because all the eastern nations, among whom 
we must look for the customs and ideas of remote 
antiquity, performed this ceremony with similar 
motives and ideas. f 

* Spencer de Legg. Hebraeor. Dissert, iii. 

f That the sacrifices of most ancient nations were rites of 
expiation, and not merely contrivances for conciliating the 
favour of the gods, by bribing them with the savoury smoke 
of the roasted victim, we learn from the wide extension 
of the practice of immolating human victims as vicarious 
sufferers. The same idea is frequently expressed in the 
Puranas and other ancient books of the Hindoos. From 
slaying animals as offerings, on which the guilt of the offender 
was supposed to be transferred, most nations proceeded to 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 421 

It must be confessed, however, that the manner in 
which the governing idea was expressed in the Mosaic 
ordinance resembles in a remarkable degree the 
Egyptian rite, and it would seem as if Moses adopted 
this as the most striking and impressive form. The 
sins of the people were imprecated by the officiating 
priest on the head of the devoted victim. The 
circumstances of this ceremony, as it was performed 
according to the Egyptian ritual, have been alluded 
in a foregoing chapter. 

There is also a coincidence in the kinds of animals 
selected for sacrifice. Moses forbade, indeed, to offer 
human victims ; and of the species of brute animals 
used by the Egyptians for this purpose, he selected 
only three, viz. oxen, sheep, and goats. Of the ox 
kind, the Hebrews were ordered to slaughter the 
females ; whereas the Egyptians chose only the males. 
But the particular colour of the victim, as set down in 
the Levitical ordinances, was exactly the same as 
that which the Egyptian ritual specified. This has 
been described in the section to which we have just 
referred. 

Spencer has remarked that Moses ordered such 
animals only to be offered in sacrifice as had never 
been subjected to the yoke, and that the same regu- 
lation existed among the Greeks and other Heathen 



nations.* 



immolate human victims on certain great occasions, as more 
noble sufferers. 

It is impossible to ascertain when this custom originated. 
The Vedas contain a strange fiction, which connects the 
allegorical immolation of Narayan with the formation of the 
world. 

* Those writers who have maintained this opinion have 



422 CEREMONAL LAWS OF THE 

It would appear then, that Moses consecrated such 
animals for sacrifice as were generally held to be pure 
and unblemished offerings. His motive in this pro- 
ceeding is evident: an opposite mode of conduct 
would have evinced a want of that attention to 
prevailing notions which is necessary for every 
legislator. 

S. In the circumstances by which legal pollution 
was contracted, there was a coincidence between the 
ideas of the Egyptians and those which Moses adopted 
as the foundation of many of his ceremonies and 
prohibitions. Many of the Egyptian customs of this 
description have been enumerated in the foregoing 
chapter. - 

In the oblations, ordained by Moses, of corn, wine, 
and oil, in the consecration of tenths and of first-fruits, 
in the celebration of festivals at the new moons, 
in the vestments of the priests, and the peculiar 
observances required of their order, there are many 



been unjustly accused of denying the typical references of the 
Mosaic rites to the great events of the Christian dispensation. 
Yet both Spencer and Michaelis have positively disclaimed any 
such intention. The latter says, a That I consider the sacri- 
fices prescribed by Moses as typical of Christ, and that I 
believe them not only justly applied to him by the Apostles in 
the New Testament, but to have been actually appointed by 
God with that express design, and previously explained in the 
book of Psalms in that as their genuine meaning, cannot be 
unknown to any reader of my Dogmatics, or of my Exposition 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews, or of my Critical Lecture on the 
40th Psalm." Michaelis on the Mosaic Law, translated by 
Dr. Smith, vol. iii. p. 57 • Dr. Spencer makes a similar asser- 
tion in several parts of his work, " De Legg. Hebrseorum." 



HEBREWS AND EGYPTIANS. 423 

points which bear a relation either of near resem- 
blance or of direct contradiction to the laws of the 
Egyptians and other celebrated nations. 

When indeed, we take all these circumstances into 
consideration, it no longer remains doubtful that 
Moses, in compiling the ceremonial ordinances of his 
code, had in his view the rites and customs of antiquity. 
His people were thoroughly imbued with the pre- 
judices and devoted to the practices of the Egyp- 
tians. He has retained those ceremonies which were 
in themselves perfectly harmless, and which tended to 
inspire pure and pious thoughts. He has copied some 
Egyptian rites, such for example as were founded on 
natural associations of ideas, and expressed in a more 
striking manner than any other, certain religious 
truths which, from their universal hold upon the 
minds of men, are shown either to be the results of a 
general conviction, or the lessons of the first fathers 
of the human race handed down by immemorial 
tradition. He has repudiated whatever was impious or 
impure, or in itself absurd and ridiculous, of which we 
have seen that there was a great abundance in the 
practices of the wise Egyptians. He has ordained 
many rites, evidently with no other purpose than to 
prevent his people from reverting into these abomi- 
nations. On the whole he has evinced, though born 
in a semi-barbarous age, and educated among a 
people who commended themselves to God by burn- 
ing red-haired men, and joining women to he-goats, 
and feeding crocodiles with their living children, so 
unblemished a conception of moral excellence, so 
profound a knowledge of the laws of the human mind, 
so clear a discrimination of the essentials of religion, 

iii 



424 CEREMONIAL LAWS. 

that, in surveying the ordinances of the Hebrew law, 
an attentive and candid inquirer cannot fail to recog- 
nise unquestionable proofs of wisdom and intelligence, 
which exceed the possible attainments of the human 
faculties. 



SECTION V. 

Origin of Circumcision, 

There is no other point connected with this inquiry 
which has occasioned so much dispute as the origin 
of Circumcision. This, however, is a question quite 
distinct from the consideration of those rites and ordi- 
nances which the Hebrews first received from Moses, 
or became acquainted with subsequently to their 
descent into Egypt and establishment in Goshen. 
We are certain that the descendants of Abraham 
practised circumcision before that event. They even 
considered it a disgrace to be connected with an un- 
circumcised race, as we learn from the conduct of 
Judah and his brethren, in the massacre of the Siche- 
mites. We know also that this custom prevailed not 
only among the Israelites, who came out of Egypt 
with Moses, but among the Edomites* and Ishmael- 
itish Arabs. f All these nations obtained it from their 
common ancestor. 

But other nations, besides the Abrahamidae, 
practised circumcision, who cannot, with so much 
probability, be supposed to have derived it from 

* Genesis, xxv. 25 — 30. f Ibid. xvi. 25. 



ORIGIN OF CIRCUMCISION. 425 

the patriarch of that stem. The Egyptians, as we 
have seen, made it a necessary condition, in order to 
admit any person to certain religious solemnities, or 
at least to the office of the priesthood. Some other 
ancient nations, connected by affinity with the Egyp- 
tians, had the same custom ; as the Colchians, who are 
supposed by Herodotus to be a colony from Egypt, 
and in Africa, the Ethiopians,* particularly the 
Troglodytes.f It extended further towards the south, 
and seems to have been propagated from Egypt 
among the Negro races in the interior ; for we learn 
from recent voyagers that it still prevails in Congo 
and Guinea.J 

We are ignorant at what period circumcision was 
adopted by the Egyptians. It appears to have been 
an established rite among them in the time of Moses.§ 

It has been maintained by some, that Abraham, or 
his descendants, introduced this rite among the Egyp- 
tians; but this is an extremely improbable conjecture. 
It must be observed that the first mention of circum- 
cision in Genesis occurs subsequently to the journey 
of Abraham and his horde into Egypt. There seems 
also at this period to have been a free and unre- 
strained intercourse between the Egyptians and their 
less civilized or less artificial neighbours, so that 
the influence of Egyptian customs and modes of 
thinking may be supposed to have extended over the 
surrounding nations. 

* Diod. lib. i. J Ibid. lib. iii. p. 165. 

% Authorities in Woodward, p. 290. 

§ This appears from Josh. v. where the renewal of circum- 
cision is ordained ; and it is observed, that the reproach of 
Egypt is now removed from Israel. 



426 



CEREMONIAL LAWS. 



A remark of Michaelis throws some light upon this 
obscure subject. This writer has observed that the 
manner in which the ordinance of circumcision is 
mentioned in Genesn, and the terms in which the 
command is announced to Abraham, are such as to 
afford ground for believing that the practice had 
previously prevailed, and was familiar to the ideas of 
that Patriarch.* 

What forbids us, then, from adopting the conclu- 
sion, obviously the most probable one, that circum- 
cision originated, at a very remote era, in some 
eastern country, possibly in Egypt ; and that it was 
thence communicated to the neighbouring nations ; 
that it was connected with some idea of purity and 
fitness for religious service, as we have seen that 
shaving the body and frequent ablutions were, and 
had become the generally received ceremony for 
dedicating men to the service of God ; and, lastly, that 
it was enjoined by a divine command to Abraham, 
to adopt this rite in His own house ? 

But this was a divine, not a human ordinance. 
Abraham received the command to circumcise his 
house immediately from God. How is this to be 
reconciled with the hypothesis above proposed ? 

This difficulty will be removed by comparing the 
origin of circumcision with that of baptism. Baptism 
is to be considered as a divine institution, not less 
assuredly than circumcision, since it is certainly 

* See Michaelis on the Mosaic Law, Dr. Smith's translation, 
vol. iii. book iv. chap. 3, an excellent disquisition on this sub- 
ject. See also Spencer de Legg. Hebrseorum. These two 
authors have collected all that is known on the subject of 
circumcision. 



ORIGIN OF CIRCUMCISION. 



427 






known to have been ordained by the divine founder 
of the Christian church. Yet it is as well known that 
baptism or lustration by water had been practised 
many ages before the Chrtstian era ; and that immer- 
sions, and ablutions and aspersions had been used 
from times immemorial in Pagan temples ; that these 
rites were regarded as necessary preparations for 
those who were to be admitted to certain religious 
privileges. If such ideas had not pre-existed in the 
opinions of men, the ordinance of baptism by John 
the Baptist, and by our Lord, would have been de- 
void of all meaning and effect on those who witnessed 
or underwent the performance of it The fact is, as 
we well know, that lustration by water was already 
connected with the idea of inward purification. 
Hence it was a fit instrument for producing a moral 
effect. 

The case is similar with respect to circumcision, 
on the hypothesis that it was a prevailing custom pre- 
viously to the time of Abraham. It was regarded 
with feeliugs of solemnity, and as the type of a 
religious engagement. No new rite could then be 
so proper or so efficacious as the seal of a solemn 
covenant. 



CRITICAL EXAMINATION 



OF THE 



REMAINS 



EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY. 



PART I. 

SURVEY OF THE SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 
COMPILATION OF MATERIALS. 

SECTION I. 

Origin of History. Probable Antiquity of the Oldest Records, 

The primitive history of the human race, the origin 
of nations, their distribution over the globe, and 
their adventures during many ages of the world, 
occupy a wide field in the most remote region of anti- 
quity, the greatest part of which is enveloped in an 
impenetrable mist. The age of Moses is the first great 
epoch of history, as recorded by contemporary 
annalists, and handed down to us in a succession of 
documents attested by creditable names. At this 
point we take our stand, as on a high watch-tower, 
the last of a long chain of posts, and direct our 
view over the obscure region beyond, where we 
discern in the distance many remarkable spots, some 
brighter than others, to which we can scarcely hope 
to gain a more immediate access. 

Let us now inquire from what source flow those 
gleams of light which are dispersed over this distant 
field ; or, in other words, to what authority are we in 

b 



*2 ORIGIN OF HISTORY. 

the first instance to refer those notices of preceding- 
events which have come down to us from ancient 
times ? Is it probable that any written memoirs of 
the previous history of the world existed in the time 
of Moses, or are we to suppose that nothing survived, 
from the ages -which had already elapsed, except 
uncertain traditions too vague and obscure to form 
the ground- work of authentic records? This is an 
inquiry which cannot be brought to a satisfactory 
issue without a careful investigation ; and we shall 
find that it is one on the solution of which the credit 
of a great part of ancient history depends. 

Perhaps there is no other method of research so 
capable of leading us to a solution of this important 
problem as an examination of the historical parts of 
the Pentateuch. If any records of the previous 
history of the human race were extant at the period 
when the book of Genesis was written, it seems 
extremely probable that some proofs of their existence 
might be traced, by means of an accurate examina- 
tion of this work, and the composition of its different 
parts. 

The genealogical tables and family records of 
various tribes, which are found embodied in the 
books of Mpses, bear the appearance of documents 
copied from written archives. They display no trait 
that might lead us to ascribe their production to the 
dictates of immediate revelation, nor are we any where 
informed that such was in reality their origin. We 
are aware that similar documents were constructed 
by the inspired writers of the Gospels, from national 
archives or family memorials. The obvious presump- 
tion is, that the author of the Pentateuch obtained 



DATE OF THE EARLIEST RECORDS. *3 

these records of a like description from a similar 
source, unless it can be shown that no such means of 
information were in existence in his time. This 
cannot be proved : on the contrary, we have many 
reasons to believe that the use of letters, and the 
practice of preserving chronicles and genealogies, was 
much more ancient than this epoch. 

If this supposition is allowed, it becomes easy 
to account for a phenomenon which can scarcely 
be explained in any other way. I allude to the 
remarkable connection discovered between many 
fragments of profane history, scattered over various 
parts of the world, and several relations contained in 
Genesis. Many of these historical fragments are of 
such a description, or have been found among nations 
so remote from Judaea, that they cannot be imagined 
to have derived their origin from the writings of the 
inspired lawgiver. Their coincidence with the narra- 
tive which he has transmitted seems to prove that 
memorials of the same events, but composed in different 
styles of representation, had been preserved by several 
nations. I shall only mention, as an example, the 
remains of Berosus, whose Chaldean history of the 
ten antediluvian generations differs but little from 
the Hebrew record, and who expressly affirms that 
Xisuthrus, after the intimation given him of the flood 
that was approaching, diligently compiled memoirs 
of the previous history of the world, from which all 
existing accounts are said to have been derived. 

But a more satisfactory result appears to me to 
have been obtained from internal evidence. For it 
has been proved, if I am not greatly mistaken, by 
a critical examination of the book of Genesis, that 



*4 ORIGIN OP HISTORY. 

this work contains several original records, each 
bearing on itself the strongest marks of authenticity 
and of high antiquity, which have been brought 
together by Moses, arranged and copied with the 
most scrupulous fidelity, so as to present a series of 
authentic archives, in which the chain of history is 
traced up to the very cradle of the human race.* 
It is scarcely necessary to point out the inference 
which results from this conclusion, in favour of the 
antiquity of other historical remains. 



SECTION II. 

Antiquity of the Egyptian Records. Historical Books, 
Inscriptions, Syringes. 

The most ancient compilers of profane history, 
whose works have survived to our times, were later 
than Moses by more than a thousand years. Hence it 
is evident that no Pagan nation can enter into compe- 
tition with the Hebrews respecting the authenticity of 
their ancient records. 

In this comparison the Egyptians stand next, 
though at a very great distance from the Hebrews, 
For the first compilers of Egyptian antiquities, who 
had access to the sources of learning, and who are 
known to us, lived subsequently to the foundation of 
the Alexandrian library. Yet there is some reason 
to presume that the documents from which they 

* See Note A, 



ANTIQUITY OF EGYPTIAN RECORDS. *5 

compiled their works had been preserved from very 
remote periods. 

As the history of the Egyptians was intimately 
connected with that of the Hebrews in early times, it 
becomes the more interesting to investigate their 
ancient records. We have thus an opportunity of 
comparing the memorials of two nations,, whose 
historians conduct us further than those of almost 
any other people into the regions of antiquity. 

We shall now proceed to examine the remains of 
Egyptian chronology, and to estimate, in the first 
place, the external evidence of their authenticity. 
We shall then compare these documents among 
themselves, and deduce the conclusions that result. 

It is impossible to ascertain from what time the 
Egyptians began to preserve historical records, but it 
is extremely probable that some memorials of the most 
remarkable events, and some sorts of chronicles or 
documents serving to mark the progress of time, 
be^an to be formed as soon as the use of letters was 
known. The early invention of astronomy, and the 
custom of connecting the lapse of secular periods 
with the dates of civil history, afford a better support 
then mere conjectural probability to this opinion. 
But we are unable to determine in what age the use 
of letters was invented. 

In the time of Moses it appears that two kinds of 
letters were known to the Hebrews, one of which 
was alphabetic ; the other seems to have been a sort 
of symbolical character, and perhaps resembled the 
Egyptian hieroglyphics.* But the Hebrews were not 

* The inscription on the J£phod is scud to have been written 



*6 ANTIQUITY OF THE 

the only people who appear to have been about the 
same period in possession of this art. It was diffused 
through the neighbouring countries. It was probably 
known to the Phoenicians or Canaanites at the time 
when that nation was conquered by the Israelites, 
on their return from Egypt. This is at least a probable 
conjecture, from the name of a town in Canaan 
mentioned in the book of Joshua. The city we 
allude to is called Kirjath Sepher, which means 
<c the City of the Book '/' it is rendered, by the 
Seventy Interpreters, the cc City of Letters/' 

Egypt was in these ages the great centre of arts 
and industry : it seems to have enjoyed, at an earlier 
period than other countries, the blessings of regular 
government. It possessed those vegetable productions 
from which the oldest materials for writing were 
formed ; and the art of preparing these materials, the 
manufacture of cotton and papyrus, was known in 
Egypt in very early times. The people of this 
country were famous for the invention of the hierogly- 
phics, which seems to have been the intermediate 
step between the rude picture-writing of barbarous 
ages and a more perfect method of representing 
ideas in permanent forms. All these circumstances 
considered, it can scarcely be doubted that the 
Egyptians were one of the nations who first pos- 
sessed written memorials. 

We know, indeed, that their learning was pro- 
verbial in the time of Moses. Several generations 

in characters resembling the " letters of a signet." It would 
appear that these were a sort of symbolical characters : they 
are plainly distinguished from the alphabetic letters used by 
Moses, in writing the Pentateuch. 



HISTORICAL RECORDS OF EGYPT. *7 

before this legislator, in the age of Joseph, the 
Egyptian hierarchy already existed, and it seems at 
this time to have been divided into those departments, 
or various colleges, which we have traced in the fore- 
going pages. We find the priests, the magicians, the 
wise-men, and the physicians, enumerated in the 
history of this patriarch. It is probable that the 
several branches of learning, of which these orders 
were the depositories, had already an existence.* 

Further than this period, we can only trace the 
history of Egyptian learning in the more dubious 
testimonies of native authors. The priests of this 
nation were unanimous in referring the origin of 
letters and of books to Thoth, or Thoyth, the god of 
learning, or perhaps a priest who assumed the name 
of his tutelar divinity. It would be very difficult 
to determine the age of Thoth ; but, according to 
the historians of Egypt, he must have flourished as 
early as the reign of the second king of Thebes, the 
son and successor of Menes. Athothes was the 
patron of literature. Eratosthenes interprets his 
name, Hermogenes, the son of Hermes. It is more 
correctly rendered " Mercuriaiis," related or devoted 
to the god of learning. f According to Manethon, 
books were composed by his order. We learn from 
other authorities, that the Memphite ^Esculapius was 
the companion and secretary of Taautos, or the 
thrice-great Thoth. 

* Warburton's Divine Legation of Moses. 

f The Egyptian name, which is represented in a Greek 
form by Athothes, is evidently HathotJi. The meaning is 
more accurately expressed above than by the gloss given by 
Eratosthenes, which has a more limited sense. 



*8 ANTIQUITY OF THE 

The records tliat were preserved in the inscriptions 
on the pillars of the first Thoth, and on the walls of the 
Syringes or subterranean recesses in the Egyptian 
temples, were perhaps more ancient than the oldest 
books. These, as we are informed by several 
writers,* contained notices of the early history of 

• Ammianus Marcellinus thus describes the Syringes, or 
winding caverns in the recesses of the Egyptian temples. 
" Sunt et Syringes subterranei quidam et flexuosi secessus, 
quos, ut fertur, periti rituum vetustorum adventare diluvium 
prescii, metuentesque ne caerimoniarum obliteraretur memoria, 
penitus operosis digestos fodinis per loca diversa struxerunt ; 
et excisis parietibus volucrum ferarumque genera multa sculp- 
serunt et animalium species innumeras, quas hierographicas 
literas appellarunt." Am. Marcell. lib. xxii. cap. 15. 

Lucan refers to these inscriptions. 

Saxis tantum volucresque feraeque 

Sculptaque servabant magicas animalia linguas. 

Marcianus Capella mentions them as containing genealogies 
of the gods. " Erantque quidam libri sacra nigredine colorati, 
quorum literse animantium credebantur effigies : quas librorum 
notas Athanasia conspiciens, quibusdam eminentibus saxis 
jussit adscribi : eademque saxa stelas appellans, Deorum 
stemmata praecepit continere." Marc. Capell. lib. ii. 

A similar description of these sculptured vaults is given by 
the prophet Ezechiel, chap. viii. 

These inscriptions are mentioned by Manethon, the Egyp- 
tian historian, who professed to have partly derived the 
materials of his works from them. Their contents seem to 
have been similar to those of the Hermetic books ; at 
least so it would appear from Manethon's statement, as we have 
it extracted by Syncellus. They were inscribed on columns 
in the Sexiadic land, which was doubtless some part of Egypt, 



HISTORICAL RECORDS OF EGYPT. *9 

Egypt, the succession of the thirty dynasties ; and here, 
as long as the sense of the hieroglyphics was known, 
the students of Egyptian learning found documents 
which were destined long to survive the nation whose 
history they recorded. 

The sculptured vaults of ancient Egypt have been 
explored, but no disciple of Thoth survives to explain 
the innumerable riddles they present. The Hermetic 
books have long ago ceased to exist, and if we should 
happen to discover the whole thirty-six thousand five 
hundred and twenty-four, which Iamblichus enume- 
rates, they would probably be as unintelligible to us 
as the historical inscriptions in the syringes. We 
have only now to mention the channels through 
which we flatter ourselves that a few memorandums, 
copied from these ancient archives, have been 
transmitted to our times. 

though we know not what particular district is distinguished 
by that name. Manethon attributes them to the elder Thoth j 
and he says that they were subsequently translated from the 
sacred language and hierographie character by Agathodsemon, 
the son of the second Hermes, and deposited in the recesses of 
the Egyptian temples. 



*I0 EGYPTIAN HISTORIAN*. MANETHON. 



SECTION III. 

Authors from whom we have obtained Information respecting 
the Egyptian History. — Manethon. Unknown Author of 
the Old Chronicle. Eratosthenes. Syncellus. Ptolemy 
of Mendes. Apion. Cheer emon. Herodotus. Diodorus, 
and others. 

One of the most important writers on the history 
and chronology of the Egyptians is Manethon, a 
man of distinguished learning, a native of the Seben- 
nytic nome, who held the office of high-priest and 
sacred scribe in the temple of Heliopolis during the 
reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. He was the author of 
several works on history, physics, and astrology. The 
most valuable of these was his Egyptian History, 
contained in three books ; which gave an account of 
the succession of Egyptian kings from the beginning 
of the monarchy under Menes, the first ruler, down to 
the establishment of the Macedonian empire. The 
history of this period was comprised by Manethon in 
thirty-one dynasties, the first thirty of which were 
supposed to contain one hundred and thirteen gene- 
rations ; and the total numbers of their reigns were, 
as Syncellus informs us, three thousand five hundred 
and fifty-five years. The thirty-one dynasties were 
preceded by a dynasty of gods and demi-gods. 

Manethon's Egyptian History has long ago been the, 



EGYPTIAN HISTORIANS. MANETHON. *11 

spoil of time, and we have nothing more of it than 
a fragment preserved by Josephus, in his Letter to 
Apion, which seems to have been copied verbatim from 
the original ; and an abstract containing the succes- 
sion of the kings, and a few historical facts, in the 
Chronography of Syncellus. The fragment given by 
Josephus comprises but a small portion of the succes- 
sion, but is very valuable. The abstract of Syncellus is 
in a less perfect state. The original work of Manethon 
seems to have been lost before the age of the last- 
mentioned chronologer ; and all that he could obtain 
of it were extracts which had been embodied by for- 
mer collectors, viz. Julius Africanus and Eusebius, in 
their compilations. These writers differed so much 
in several parts of their extracts, that it was evident 
either that great errors had crept into the copies of 
Manethon's work, or that one of them must have 
corrupted it by design. 

This work of Manethon was undertaken, as it 
appears, at the request of Ptolemy Philadelphus. The 
sources whence the author professed to have derived 
his information, were the sacred inscriptions on the 
columns of Hermes, and in the Seriadic country, and 
the books attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. 

With the materials obtained from these sources it 
appears that some statements were interwoven, which 
the compiler admitted to be of equivocal and uncertain 
authority.* 

We have from Syncellus another Egyptian chro- 
nicle which, as we are informed by that compiler, and 
as it appears from internal evidence, is more ancient 

* Josephus, Epist. ad Apiou. 



*I2 EGYPTIAN HISTORIANS. 

than the age of Manethon. This old Egyptian 
chronicle., as Syncellus terms it, terminates with the 
reign of Nectanebo, that is, with the second year of 
the one hundred and seventh Olympiad ; and that 
period is the most probable date that can be assigned 
for its composition. Syncellus conjectures that Mane- 
thon was led into error by it ; but it differs, in many 
important particulars, from the chronology of that 
writer. We shall insert the whole of it in a following 
page, and shall therefore say no more at present, than 
that there is no reason for suspecting this document, 
as some have done, to be the production of a later 
period than the date to which it is referred by its 
construction. It is composed on the plan of the com- 
putations known to be contained in the ancient Her- 
metic books. If it had been written subsequently to 
Manethon's time, we should scarcely have found so 
many contradictions between these two chronicles; 
and the claims to antiquity in the more recent work 
would scarcely have exceeded by so many myriads of 
years those of the high priest of Heliopolis. If it had 
been a forgery of a late age, that is, of Christian 
times, it would not have contradicted the dates of the 
Hebrew Scriptures, by assuming so vast a period for 
the duration of the Egyptian monarchy. 

There is no writer on the Egyptian history who has 
higher pretensions to our regard than Eratosthenes. 
No Greek author has surpassed him in learning, or 
has enjoyed greater opportunities of information, and 
very few have maintained an equal reputation for 
integrity. Eratosthenes was a native of Cyrene. He 
was born in the one hundred and twenty-sixth Olym- 
piad, two hundred and seventy-six years before Christ, 



OLD CHRONICLE. ERATOSTHENES. *13 

and, in the fiftieth year of his age, was appointed 
superintendant of the Alexandrian library. He lived 
to complete his eightieth year; and, at length, finding 
his sight to fail> is said to have starved himself to death. 
He was the author of that work on geography which 
is frequently referred to by Strabo. He was likewise 
a celebrated astronomer and mathematician.* 

Eratosthenes was equally distinguished as a chro- 
nologer. By order of Ptolemy he formed a catalogue 
of the succession of Egyptian kings, for which he 
collected materials from records in the Egyptian 
language, and from information communicated by the 
sacred scribes of Diospolis.f To this headded interpre- 
tations in Greek of the Egyptian names. The work 
itself has long ago perished, with the exception of a 
fragment, extracted by the diligent compiler Syncellus, 
from the chronology of Apollodorus. The original 
works of Eratosthenes seem to have been no longer 
extant in the time of Syncellus. 

To Syncellus himself we are under the most 
important obligations, for having preserved most of 
the fragments above mentioned. 

The learned compiler, who is known under this 
appellation, was a Constantinopolitan monk, named 
George, who, in the time of Constantine Porphy- 
rogennetes, was Syncellus to the partriarch Tarasius, 
that is, next to him in dignity, and destined to be his 
successor. J He is said to have compiled his work 
twenty-one years before the death of Charlemain, 
emperor of the West. 

* Fabric. Biblioth. Graec. torn. iv. p. 123 et seq. 

f Syncelli Chronograph, p. 91 et p. 147- 
1 Voss. de Histor. Grsec. Fabric. Bibloth. Graec. 



*14 EGYPTIAN HISTORIANS. SYNCELLUS. 

It appears that Syncellus chiefly obtained the ma- 
terials for chronology which he has left us from the 
previous compilations of Africanus and Eusebius. 
These works have long ago perished, with the excep- 
tion of fragments of the former, extracted by other 
writers, such as Syncellus, and a very imperfect and 
scanty Latin translation of the latter, executed by 
Jerome, which Joseph Scaliger has published with 
the addition of all the remains of the original which 
he could collect from later compilations. The collec- 
tion thus formed issued from the press under the title 
of Eusehius's Chronicle, and has been quoted as such 
by many modern authors. 

Besides the tables of the Old Chronicle, the dynas- 
ties of Manethon, and the laterculus of Eratosthenes, 
Syncellus has given us a continued series of Egyptian 
kings, from Menes down to the Persian conquest, 
which seems to have been deduced by himself from 
various documents. We trace a great portion of it 
in the lists of Manethon ; but the former part, con- 
taining a succession of kings from Menes to Teth- 
mosis, who expelled the Shepherd dynasty from 
Egypt, has either been formed purely from conjecture, 
and is therefore an absolute forgery, or was deduced 
from materials which we can no longer trace. As we 
have no reason for suspecting a writer so industrious 
and learned as Syncellus of a fraud of this nature, it 
seems most probable that he collected the earlier part 
of his series from the works of some old historians, 
which are now lost. We have reason to believe that 
means of information existed in his age which have 
since been destroyed by the ruinous hand of time ; 
for we know that several authors of reputation had 



PTOLEMY MENDESIUS. APION. *15 

written works on the Egyptian annals and antiquities. 
Of these Syncellus may be supposed to have availed 
himself, either directly, or indirectly through the 
collections of previous compilers. 

One of the old writers, of whose works we have 
to regret the loss, is Ptolemy, a priest of Mendes, 
whose age is uncertain. It appears that he lived 
before the time of Tiberius, and the reign of the 
Ptolemies seems to be the most probable period that 
can be assigned to him.* 

Ptolemy wrote, as it seems, a work in three books, 
on the history of the kings of Egypt, which is quoted 
by Apion.f It is uncertain whether this is the same 
book that is cited by Tatian under the title of Xpovoi, 
or Chronicles. The author is mentioned also by 
Tertullian and Cyril, and it is unknown at what 
period his works were lost. 

Apion, the grammarian, lived in the time of Tibe- 
rius, and acquired so much fame, that he was called 
by that emperor " Cymbal urn mundi."J His learning 
is commended by x\fricanus and by Tatian. His prin- 
cipal work was an Egyptian History, which is men- 
tioned with respect by Aulus Gellius : the fourth 
book of it has been cited by Clement of Alexandria.^ 
He was also the author of a work against the Jews, 

* See Vossius de Hist. Grsec. 

f Apud Clement. Strom, lib. i. Euseb. Evang. Prrep. lib. 
x. cap. 12. 

% Voss. ubi supra. 

§ Clemens, Strom, i. Euseb. Prsep. Evang. iii. cap. 3. 
Aulus Gellius lib. v. cap. 14. et vii. cap. 8. He is also men- 
tioned by Pliny, lib. xxxvii. c. 5 ; and by Justin. Orat. ad 
Gentes. 



*16 EGYPTIAN HISTORIANS. 

to which Josephus replied, in his well-known Epistle 
to Apion. 

Athough Apion boasted that he conferred immor- 
tality on those who were mentioned in his books, 
his works are now entirely lost, with the exception of 
some passages cited by later authors. We do not 
know at what period they ceased to exist ; and it is 
possible that Syncellus may have had access to them, 
or to other writers who had copied from them. 

Chaeremon also wrote a work on Egyptian history, 
of which we have a fragment cited by Josephus. 
This is probably the same writer to whom Porphyry 
appeals as an author of great credit on the philosophy 
of the ancient Egyptians.* Porphyry calls him an 
eminent philosopher among the Stoics, a man stu- 
dious of truth and accuracy ; and St. Jerome refers to 
his account of the Egyptian priests with an encomium 
upon his eloquence. f We have already cited a pas- 
sage of Chaeremon preserved by Porphyry in the 
letter written by him under the name of Annebon, to 
which Iamblichus replied in his work on the Mys- 
teries.;!; Chaeremon was the instructor of Dionysius, 
who presided over the Alexandrian library, from the 
time of Nero to that of Trajan.§ 

It is uncertain whether the author above men- 
tioned is the same Chaeremon of whom Strabo speaks 
in the seventeenth book of his Geography. The 
latter professed to be a hierogammateus, or sacred 

* Porphyr. de Abstinentia, lib. iv\ cap. 6 ct $. 

t Hieron. adv. Jovin. ii. 13. 

% Iamblich. de Myst. iEgypt. 

§ Vossius de Histor. Grsec. Fabric. Bibl. Graec. 



CHjEREMON. HERODOTUS. DIODORUS. *17 

scribe; and pretended to be acquainted witb the 
hieroglyphics and mystical philosophy of the Egyp- 
tians. He sailed with iElius Gallus, in his voyage up 
the Nile; and was much derided, as Strabo says, 
on account of his conceit and vain pretensions to 
learning. 

Chaeremon's works are no longer extant; but 
they existed in the time of Africanus, Eusebius, and 
other chronologers, whose compilations were extant 
in the time of Syncellus. Chaeremon is indeed cited 
by Tzetzes, at a much later period than the age of 
Syncellus. 

The only authors who remain to be mentioned are 
Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus. 

The former has been suspected of plagiarism^ and 
has been accused of having copied a great part of his 
Egyptian history from the works of his predecessor, 
Hecataeus. Herodotus himself informs us, that he 
obtained his information from some Egyptian priests, 
and we have no reason to doubt, his assertion. 

During the latter period, from the reign of Psam- 
mitichus, when the Greeks had become acquainted 
with the manners and history of the Egyptians, Hero- 
dotus has given us an exact account of the succession 
of kings. In this part of his narrative we may fully rely 
upon his correctness. The former part contains many 
puerile absurdities. The guides, who had led him 
through the temples,4howed rows of wooden statues, 
placed one after another, and representing kings or 
priests for three hundred and forty-one generations ; 
and he informs us that a priest read to him out of a 
book the names of three hundred and thirty kings who 
had reigned successively. It is very possible that 

d 



*18 HERODOTUS. DIODORUS. 

Herodotus might misunderstand his guide, especially 
as it cannot be supposed that the Grecian traveller 
understood the Egyptian langauge. At any rate, a 
nameless person, intent on magnifying the wonders 
of his native temples, and making a display of their 
antiquity to an admiring stranger, can scarcely 
be regarded as an authority worthy of implicit 
confidence. 

Diodorus seems to have taken Herodotus as his 
guide in his annals of the Egyptian monarchy. He 
only deviates occasionally, to introduce particulars 
derived from other sources. 

Some incidental notices respecting the Egyptian 
history are to be found in scattered fragments from 
the works of Artapanus, Alexander Polyhistor, and 
Polemo. The two former wrote on the antiquities 
of the Jews, and the latter on the ancient chronology 
of the Greeks.* 

We shall now proceed to investigate the antiquity 
of the Egyptian monarchy, availing ourselves in the 
best manner we can of the resource above mentioned. 
The following is the passages of Syncellus, to which 
we find the Old Egyptian Chronicle. 

* Fragments of these writers are scattered through the 
Stromata of Clemens, the Evangelical Preparation of Eusebius, 
and the Chronography of Syncellus. 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS. OLD CHRONICLE. 



19 



SECTION IV. 

Copy of the Old Chronicle and the Chronicle of Manethon. 

ee There is among the Egyptians a certain ancient 
Chronicle, by which I apprehend that Manethon was 
led into error. It embraces the prodigious period 
of thirty-six thousand five hundred and twenty- 
five years, which are comprised in the history of 
thirty dynasties, and one hundred and thirteen gene- 
rations. It begins with the Auritae, who are succeeded 
by the Mestraei; these are followed by the native 
Egyptians. It is as follows : — 

Years. 
Vulcan 

No time is assigned to Vulcan, because he shines 
both by day and by night. 

The Sun, the offspring of Vulcan, reigned 30,000 

Afterwards Saturn, and the rest of the twelve gods, 

reigned 3,984 

Afterwards the eight demi-gods 217 



Fifteen generations of the Cynic circle reigned. 

The 16th dynasty of Tanites, consisting of 
generations, reigned 
17th of Memphites 
18th of Memphites 
19th of Diospolites 
20th of Diospolites 



eight 



4 

14 

5 

8 



generations 



443 



190 
103 
348 
194 

228 



*20 EGYPTIAN RECORDS. OLD CHRONICLE. 

Years. 

The 21st of Tanites .... 6 generations 121 

22d of Tanites .... "3 48 

23d of Diospolites 2 19 

24th of Saites 3 .... 44 

25th of ^Ethiopians .... 3 44 

26th of Memphites 7 .... 177 

27th of Persians .... 5 .... 124 

29th 39 

30th of Tanites .... 1 18 

" The sum of the reigns of the SO dynasties is 36525 
years, which, divided by 25, gives the period of the 
fabulous apocatastasis or renovation of the zodiac, so 
celebrated among the Egyptians and Greeks. At this 
epoch the signs of the zodiac are supposed to return to 
the exact places which they occupied in the heavens, 
when the Sun was in the first degree of Aries, as it is 
explained in the Genica of Hermes, and the Cyrannic 
books/'* 

* The two periods to which Syncellus alludes were cele- 
brated cycles in the Egyptian system of computing time. 

The cycle of twenty-five years was used for adjusting 
the lunar and solar motions, and was accommodated to the 
Egyptian civil year of three hundred and sixty-five days. 
Twenty-five Egyptian years, contained nine thousand one 
hundred and twenty-five days, which exceed the total number 
contained in three hundred and nine lunations, by only one 
hour nine minutes and ten seconds. 

The other cycle was the celebrated Sothiacal period of one 
thousand four hundred and sixty solar years, which are 
equal to one thousand four hundred and sixty-one Egyptian 
years. For as the Egyptian year of three hundred and sixty-five 
days was deficient by a quarter of a day, a day was lost in every 
four years. This deficiency would, in 4 x 365— 1460 years, 



OLD CHRONICLE. MANETHON. *21 

The twenty-eighth dynasty, consisting of one Saite, 
may be is inserted in the Old Chronicle from Mane- 
thon, being evidently an accidental omission. Still 
178 years are wanting in order to fill up the sum 
total. We shall have occasion to consider from what 
part of the series it is probable that this number has 
been dropped. 

We now proceed to Manethon, and begin with his 
dynasty of gods and demi-gods. The following is the 
passage of Syncellus in which it is contained. 

<e Manethon, the Sebennyte, a high-priest* of the 
profane religion in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, 
writing to the king concerning the first sixteen Egyp- 
tian dynasties, beginning with the seven gods, reckons 
1985 years for the period of their reign, the first of 
whom, Vulcan, reigned 9000 years. These 9000 
years/' continues Syncellus, " have been reckoned by 
some of our historians as so many lunar months ; and 
the whole number of days contained in 9000 lunar 
revolutions, being reduced into solar years of 365 days, 
a period of 724 years and a half with four days has 
been brought out as the reign of Vulcan." This 
hypothesis is treated by Syncellus with the contempt it 



amount to an entire year, and therefore the beginning of the civil 
year would, in that space of time, be restored to its original 
place \ the first day of the month Thoth having shifted its place 
backwards through all the seasons. See Mayer's Chronological 
Tables, and Hales's Chronology, vol. i. p. 141. 

By multiplying these two cycles into each other, the Egyp- 
tians fancied, as it appears, that they produced the period 
called the great year, at the end of which all the planets 
returned to the same place in the zodiac. 

* Syncellus^ Chron. p. 18. 



*22 EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 

merits. However he has set down the following table 
of gods and demi-gods, with their reigns, computed on 
this system. It is as follows: — 



First Dynasty. 

1 . Vulcan reigned 724 J years and 4 days 

2. The Sun, the son of Vulcan 86 years 

3. Agathodaemon 52^ and 10 days 

4«i Saturn 40j 

5. Osiris and Iris 35 

6 * * * mm , 

7. Typhon 29 

Total.. 247 



8. Horus, the demi-god 25 

9. Mars, the demi-god 23 

10. Anubis the demi-god 17 

11. Hercules, the demi-god 15 

12. Apollo, the demi-god 25 

13. Amnion, the demi-god 30 

14. Tithoes, the demi-god 27 

15. Sosus, the demi-god : 32 

16. Jupiter, the demi-god 20 

Total.. 214 



There is evidently some mistake in the numbers 
inserted in this table. The sum total bears no 
relation to the total period before mentioned by 
Syncellus,, viz. 1985. It would seem that the reigns 
in the table are all reduced from some larger numbers, 
by the same method which produces 724-§- and four 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. *23 

days out of 9000. Now,, if we reverse this compu- 
tation, which is founded on an idle conjecture, and 
restore the original numbers, we shall have the sums 
total as follows : 



Vulcan 9000 

The six succeeding gods .... 265&| 
The nine demi-gods 3068^- 



Total 147264 

This sum approaches nearly to the large numbers 
mentioned by Herodotus, and Diodorus, who, how- 
ever, contradict each other and themselves, as often 
as they allude to the fabulous chronology of the 
gods. 

We now insert the catalogue of the thirty-one 
dynasties of mortal kings. 

This being an important series in chronology, 
Syncellus says that he has copied two of the most 
celebrated editions of Manethon's succession of 
dynasties, as he found them respectively in the works 
of Africanus and Eusebius. These tables are as 
follows. 



24 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 



THE THIRTY DYNASTIES 
ACCORDING TO AFRICANUS. 

Years. 
After the Demigods began 
the first series of Kings, 
of whom the first, viz. 
Menes Theeinites,reign- 
ed 62 

2. Athothis, son of Menes 57 

3. Kenkenes, his son .... 31 

4. Ouenephes, his son . . 21 

5. Ousaphaidos 20 

6. Miebidos 26 

7» Semempsis 18 

8. Bienaches 26 

Sum, 253 



THE THIRTY DYNASTIES 
ACCORDING TO EUSEBIUS. 

Years. 
Menes Thenites, from 
whom the series begins, 
is the Menes of Herodo- 
tus. He reigned .... 60 

2. Athosthis, son of Menes 27 

3. Kenkenes 39 

4. Ouenephes 42 

5. Ousaphaes 20 

6. Niebes 26 

7. Semempsis 18 

8. Oubienthes 26 

Sum, 252 



Historical Notices contained in the Chronicle. 

Menes is said to have been a great general : he made warlike 
expeditions into foreign countries. He was killed by a hippo- 
potamus. 

Athothis founded the palace of the kings at Memphis. He 
practised physic, and compiled books of anatomy. 

In the reign of Ouenephes there was a great famine in Egypt. 
The pyramids of Cochome were founded at this time. 

In the reign of Semempsis many prodigies happened in Egypt* 
and a great plague infested the country. 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. *25 

II. Dynasty, of Nine Kings. II. Dynasty , of Nine Thinite 

Kings. 
Years. Years. 

1. Bochus 1. Boethos 38 

2. Choos 2. Kaiachos 39 

3. Biophis 3. Binothris 47 

4. * * * 4. Tlas 17 

5. * * * 5. Sethenes 41 

6. * * * 6. Choires 17 

7. * * * 7. Nephercheres 25 

8. Sesochris 48 8. Sesochris 

9. Cheneres 30 9. * * * 

These nine kings reigned, 

Sum of this Dynasty, 302 together, 297 



III. Dynasty, of Nine 
Memphite Kings. 



III. Dynasty, of Eight 
Memphite Kings. 



1 . Necherophes 28 

2. Tosorthros 29 



1. Nacherochis. 

2. Sesorthos. 



Historical Notices. 



In the reign of Bochus a great earthquake at Bubastos 
destroyed many people. 

Apis, Mnevis, and the Mendesian goat, were deified in the 
reign of Choos. 

In the reign of Biophis, women were allowed a share in the 
administration. 

Nothing important is related of the three kings who succeeded 
Biophis. 

In the reign of the seventh king, the Nile flowed with honey 
eleven days. — Africanus. 

In the reign of Nacherochis, the Lybians revolted from 
the Egyptians ; but, terrified by a portentous increase of the 
Moon, surrendered. 

Sesorthos excelled in the art of healing, and was called the 
Egyptian iEsculapius. He taught men to build with hewn 
stones, and to engrave characters skilfully. — Euseblus. 

e 



*26 EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 

Years. Years. 

S. Tyris 7 The remaining six were in 

4. Mesochris 17 no way distinguished. 

5. Soiphis .. 16 

6. Tosertasis 19 # % * 

7. Achis 42 

8. Siphouris 30 

9. Kerpheres 26 

Sum total, 214 Sum total of these reigns, 198 



IV. Dynasty, Eight Memphite 
Kings of another race. 

1. Soris 29 

2. Souphis 63 

3. Souphis 66 

4. Mencheres 63 

5. Rhatoises 25 

6. Bicheres 22 

7. Sebercheres 7 

8. Thamphthis 9 

Sum total, 274 



IV. Dynasty, Seventeen Mem- 
phite Kings of another family . 



These kings reigned .... 448 



V. Dynasty of Elephantinites. 



V. Dynasty of Thirty-one 
Elephantinite Kings. 



1. Ousercheris 28 

2. Sephres 13 

3. Nephercheres 20 



1. Othoes 

2. * 

3. * 



Historical Notices. 



The third of these kings, named Souphis, built the great pyra- 
mid, which Herodotus attributed to Cheops. He despised the 
gods ; but, repenting, wrote a book on sacred rites, which was 
very celebrated in Egypt. 

Othoes was killed by his guards. — Eusebius. 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. *27 

Years. Years. 

-4. Sisiris 7 4. Phiops 100 

5. Cheres 20 

6. Rathouris « .... 44 * * * 

7. Mercheres 9 

8. Tarcheres 44 

9. Obnus 33 

Sum total.. 248 

VI. Dynasty of Six Memphite VI. Dynasty. 

Kings. 

1. Othoes, killed by his 

guards 

° * * # 

2. Phios 53 

3. Methonsouphis 7 

#• # # 

4. Phiops 100 

5. Meutesouphis 1 

6. Nitocris 12 Nitocrii 3 

Sum total. . 203 

VII. Dynasty of Seventy VII. Dynasty of Five 

Memphite Kings, Memphite Kings, 

Reigned 70 days Who reigned 75 days 

* * * * * * 

VIII. Dynasty of Twenty-seven VIII. Dynasty of Five Memphite 

Memphite Kings, Kings, 

Reigned 146 years Who reigned .... 100 years 

* * * ♦ * * 

Historical Notices. 

Phiops began to reign when six years old, and reigned to the 
hundredth year. — Eusebins. 

Nitocris, was a noble and beautiful woman, of fair (£av5ij) 
complexion, who built the third pyramid. 



*28 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS 



IX. Dynasty, Nineteen 
Heracleotic Kings, 

Years. 

Who reigned , 409 

1. Achthoes 



IX. Dynasty, Four Heracleo- 
polite Kings, 

Years. 

Reigned 100 

1. Achthos 



X. Dynasty of Nineteen 
Heracleotic Kings, 

Who reigned 185 

* * # 



X. Dynasty of Nineteen 
Heracleopolite Kings. 

Reigned 185 



XI. Dynasty of Sixteen 
Diospolite Kings, 



IX. Dynasty of Sixteen 
Diospolite Kings. 



Who reigned 4S Reigned 43 



After whom 
Ammenemes reigned . . 



16 



Thus far Man ethon proceeds 
in his first tome. The number 
of kings hitherto is 192, whose 
reigns amount to 2350 years 
and 70 days. 



After whom 
Ammenemes reigned .... 16 

Thus far the first tome of 
Manethon, including 192 
kings, 2300 years, and 79 days. 



Historical Notices. 

Achthoes was more cruel than any of his predecessors j and, 
after perpetrating many atrocities through all Egypt, he was 
afflicted with madness and killed by a crocodile. 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. 



29 



SECOND TOME OF MANETHON S CHRONICLE. 



XII. Dynasty of Seven 
Diospolite Kings. 

Years. 

1. Geson Goses, or Seson- 
choris, son of Ammene- 
mes 46 

2. Ammenemes 38 

3. Sesostris 48 

4. Lachares 8 

5. Ammeres 8 

6. Ammenemes 8 

7. Skemiophris, his sister 4 

Sum total, 160 



XII. Dynasty of Seven 
Diospolite Kings. 

Years. 

1. Sesynchoris, son of 
Ammenemes 46 

2. Ammenemes 38 

3. Sesostris 48 

4. Labaris 8 

His three successors 

reigned 42 



Sum total, 245 



XIII. Dynasty of Diospolitans. 
Sixty kings reigned 184 



XIII. Dynasty of Diopoliians. 
Sixty kings reigned. . . . 453 



XIV. Dynasty. 



XIV. Dynasty of Seventy-six 
Xoite Kings, 

Reigned 184 

or 484 



Historical Notices. 

Ammenemes was killed by his eunuchs. — Africamis. 

Sesostris was four cubits, three palms, and two inches in stature. 
He conquered all Asia, and all the country as far as Thrace : he 
erected monuments every where of his victories " insculpique 
voluit inter fortes, virorum propria monumentis ; inter imbelles, 
mulierum." He was reckoned the greatest king after Osiris. 

Labaris built the labyrinth in the Arsenoitic nome, for a 
sepulchre. — Eusebius. 



*30 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 



XV. Dynasty of Shepherds. 

Years. 

1. Saites, who gave name 

to the Saite nome .... 19 

2. Beon, or Byon 44 

3. Pachnan, or Apachnas 61 

4. Staan 50 

5. Archies 49 

6. Aphobis, or Aphophis 61 



XV. Dynasty of Diopolite 
Kings, 

Years. 
Who reigned 250 



Sum total, 284 



XVI. Dynasty of Greek* XVI. Dynasty of Five Theban 

Shepherds. Kings, 

Thirty-two Kings reigned 518 Who reigned 190 

vfi ^P ^v* TflP ?F Tf" 

# # # # * # 

XVII. Dynasty of other XVII. Dynasty consisted of 

Shepherds 3 and Thebans. foreign Shepherds from 

Phoenice. 
Forty-three Shepherds & 

forty-three Thebans of 

Diospolis 153 1. Saites, who reigned .. 19 

2. Beon 43 

* * * 3. Aphophis 14 

4. Archies 30 

# * # 

Sum total, 106 

Historical Notices. 

The Fifteenth Dynasty were six foreign Kings from Phoenice, 
who made themselves masters of Memphis. They also built a 
city in the Sethroitic nome, whence they made an incursion, and 
gained possession of Egypt. — Africanus. 

In the reign of Aphophis, Joseph came to Egypt.— Eusebius. 

* Probably " Other Shepherds." 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. 



31 



XVIII. Dynasty of Sixteen 
Diospolite Kings. 

Years. 
1. Amos 

S. Chebros 13 

3. Amenophthis 21 

4. Amersis 22 

5. Misaphris 13 

6. Misphragmouthosis . . 26 

7. Touthmosis 9 

8. Amenophis, or Mem- 
non 31 

9. Horus 37 

10. Acherres 32 

11. Rhos 6 

12. Chebres 12 

13. Acherres 12 

14. Armeses 5 

15. Rammeses 1 

16. Amenoph 19 



Sum total,, 293 



XVIII. Dynasty of Sixteen 
Diospolite Kings. 

Years. 

1. Amosis 25 

2. Chebron 13 

3. Ammenophis 21 

4. Miphris 12 

5. Misphragmouthosis . . 26 

6. Touthmosis 9 

7. Amenophis, or Mem- 
non 31 

8. Orus 36 or 38 

9. Achencherses 12 

10. Athoris 39 

11. Chencheres 16 

12. Cherres 15 

13. Armes or Danaus .... 5 

14. Ammeses, or ^Egyptus 68 

15. Menophis 40 

* * * 

Sum total, 348 



XIX. Dynasty of Seven 
Diospolitan Kings. 

1. Sethos 51 

2. Rhapsaces 61 



XIX. Dynasty of Five 
Diospolitan Kings. 

1. Sethos 55 

2. Rhapses 66 



Historical Notices. 

In the reign of Amos, Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt. — 
Africanus. Syncellus says, " In his time Moses was educated in 

Egypt." 

In the reign of Misphragmouthosis the deluge of Deucalion 
happened. 

Amenophis, was called Memnon, of whom was the vocal statue. 
— Africanus. 

In the reign of Chencheres, Eusebius conjectures that the Exode 
happened. 



*32 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 



Years, 

3. Ammenephthes 20 

4. Rammeses 60 

5. Ammenemnes 5 

6. Thouoris — 



Sum total, 209 



Years. 

3. Ammenephthes ...... 40 

4. Ammenemmes 26 

5. Thouoris 7 



Sum total, 194 



THIRD TOME OF MANETHON S CHRONICLE. 



XX. Dynasty of Diospolite 
Kings. 



XX. Dynasty of Diospolite 
Kings. 



Twelve kings reigned . . 135 Twelve kings reigned . . 178 



XXI. Dynasty of Seven Tanite 
Kings. 



XXI. Dynasty of Seven Tanite 
Kings. 



1. Smedes 26 

2. Psousenes, orPsousenes 46 

3. Nephelcheres 4 

4. Amenenophthis 9 

5. Osochor 6 

6. Pinaches 9 

7. Sousennes 30 



1. Smendis 26 

2. Psousennes 41 

3. Nephercheres ■„ . . 4 

4. Amenophthis 9 

5. Osochor 6 

6. Psinaches 9 

7. Psousennes 35 



Sum total, 130 



Sum total, 130 



Historical Notices. 



Thouoris, called Polybus by Homer, was the husband of Alcandra 
who entertained Menelaus. 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. 



*33 



XXII. Dynasty, Nine 
Bubastite Kings. 



Years. 

1. Sesonchis 21 

2. Os6r5th 15 

3. * * * -| 

4. *". * * > 25 

5. * * * J 

6. Takellothis 13 

7. * * 

8. * * 

9. * * 



* J 



XXII. Dynasty, Three 
Bubastite Kings, 

Years. 

1. Sesenchosis 21 

2. Osorthon 15 

3. Takellothis 13 

Together, 49 



Sum total, 120 



XXIII. Dynasty, Four 
Tanite Kings. 

1 . Petoubates 40 

2. Osorcho 8 

3. Psammous 10 

4. Zet 31 

Sum total, 89 



XXIII. Dynasty, Three 
Tanite Kings. 

1. Petoubastes 25 

2. Osorthon 9 

3. Psammous 10 

Sum total, 44 



XXIV. Dynasty. 
Bocchoris the Saite .... 6 



XXIV. Dynasty. 
Bocchoris the Saite .... 44 



Historical Notices. 

In the reign of Petoubates was the first Olympiad. — Africanus. 

Osorthon was by the Egyptians called Hercules. 

In the reign of Bocchoris a lamb was heard to speak. 

/ 



*34 



EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 



XXV. Dynasty, Three 
^Ethiopian Kings. 

Years. 

Sabbacon 8 

Seueclios 14 



3. Tarcos 18 

Sum total, 40 



XXV. Dynasty, Three 
^Ethiopians. 

Years. 

1. Sabbacon 12 

2. Seuechos 12 

3. Taracos 24 



Sum total, 44 



XXVI. Dynasty, Nine Saite 
Kings. 

1. Stephinates 7 

2. Nerepsos . . ; 6 

3. Nechao 8 

4. Psammiticus 54 

5. Nechao 2, 6 

6. Psammouthis 6 

7. Ouaphris 19 

8. Amosis 44 

9. Psammacherites 6 months 

Sum total, 150| 



XXVI. Dynasty, Nine Saite 
Kings. 

1 . Ammeris the Ethiopian 12 

2. Stephanathis 7 

3. Nekepsos 6 

4. Nechao 8 

5. Psammitichus 45 

6. Nechao 2, . , 6 

7. Psammouthis, or Psam- 
mitichus 2 17 

8. Ouaphris 25 

9. Amosis 42 

Sum total.. 168 



XXVII. Dynasty, Eight 
Persians. 

1. Cambyses 6 



XXVII. Dynasty, Eight 
Persians, 



1 . Cambyses 3 



Historical Notices. 

Sabbacon carried Bocchoris into captivity and burnt him alive. 

Nechao 2 besieged Jerusalem, and carried king Joachas into 
captivity. — Africanus. 

Under Ouaphris, the remainder of the Jews sought refuge, 
when Jerusalem was taken by the Assyrians. — Africanus. 

Cambyses, in the fifth year of his reign over Persia, conquered 
Egypt. 



CHRONICLE OF MANETHON. 



*35 



Years. 

2. Darius Hystaspis .... 36 

3. Xerxes the Great .... 21 

4. Artabanus ..7 months 

5. Artaxerxes 41 

6. Xerxes .... 2 months 
7- Sogdianus ..7 months 

S. Darius, son of Xerxes 19 



Years. 

2. The Magi . . 7 months 

3. Darius 3 

4. Xerxes, son of Darius 21 
5. Artaxerxes Longimanus 40 

6. Xerxes 2 7 months 

7. Sogdianus ..7 months 

8. Darius, son of Xerxes 19 



Sum total, 124- 



Sum total, 120 



XXVIII. Dynasty. XXVIII. Dynasty. 

Amyrteos of Sais 6 Amyrtaeus the Saite ...... 6 



XXIX. Dynasty, Four Men- 
desian Kings. 

1. Nephereites „ « . 6 

2. Achoris 13 

3. Psammouthis 1 

4. Nephorotes. . 4 months 



XXIX. Dynasty, Five Men- 
desian Kings. 

1 Nepherites 6 

2. Achoris 13 

3. Psammouthis 1 

4. Nepherites ..4 months 

5. Mouthis 1 



Sum total, 20^- 



Sum total, 21 : 



XXX. Dynasty, Three 
Sebennyte Kings. 

1. Nectanebes IS 

2. Teos 2 

3. Nectanebes IS 

Sum total, 38 



XXX. Dynasty, Three 
Sebennyte Kings. 

1. Nectanebes 10 

2. Teos 2 

3. Nectanebes 8 

Sum total, 20 



*36 EGYPTIAN RECORDS. 

XXXI Dynasty, Three XXXI. Dynasty, Three 

Persian Kings. Persian Kings. 

Years. Years. 

1. Ochus, in the twentieth 1. Ochus, in the twentieth 

year of his reign over year of his reign 2 

Persia 2 2. Arses 4 

2. Arses 3 3. Darius, who was con- 

3. Darius 4 quered by Alexander . . 6 

Sum total, 9 Sum total, 12 



SECTION V. 

Comparison of the two foregoing Chronicles* 

It will not be amiss, before we proceed further, to 
pause and compare the Old Chronicle with that of 
Manethon. By this comparison some light will be 
thrown on the nature of both. 



I. DYNASTY OF GODS. 



Old Chronicle. 

Years. 
1. Vulcan reigned an in- 
definite number of years 
S. Helios, the Sun 30,000 

3. The twelve gods, in- 
cluding Saturn 3,684 

4. The eight demigods. . 217 



Chronicle of Manethon. 

Years. 

Vulcan 9,000 

The Sun, and the rest 
of the six gods, in- 
cluding Saturn ...... 2,658-! 

The nine demigods .... 3,068-! 



COMPARISON OF THE TWO CHRONICLES. 



*37 



II. DYNASTIES OF MORTAL RINGS, 



Old Chronicle. 

Years. 
1st generation of the 

Cynic Circle 

2d generation 

3d generation 

4th generation 

Sth generation 

6th generation 

7th generation 

8th generation 

9th generation 

"10th generation 

11th generation 

12th generation 

13th generation 

14th generation 

15th generation 

Sum total of the 15 
generations 445 

16th Dynasty of Tanites 

... 190 

1 7th of Memphites . . .105 

18th of Memphites ...348 

19 194 

20 228 

21 121 

22 48 

23 ! 19 

24 44 

25 44 

26 177 

27 224 

28 ** 

29 59 

50 18 



Manethon, ac 

Africanus. 

Years. 
1st Dynasty of Thinites 

253 

2d of Thinites 502 

3d of Memphites ...214 

4th of Memphites 274 

5th of Elephantines...248 

6th of Memphites 503 

7th of Memphites 70 days 
8th of Memphites . . .146 

9th cf Heracleots 409 

10th of Heracleots 185 

11th of Diospolites 45 

12th of Diospolites 160 

13th of Diospolites 184 

14th * * * 
15th of Shepherds 284 

16th of Shepherds 558 

17th of Shepherds and 

Thebans 253 

18th of Diospolites . . .265 
19th of Diospolites ...2C8 
20th of Diospolites ...135 

21st cf Tanites 150 

22d cf Bubastites 120 

25d of Tanites 89 

24th of Saite 6 

25th of Ethiopians 40 

26th of Sa'ites 150 

27th of Persians 124 

28th of Sa'ites 6 

29th cf Mendesians ...20 
50th of Sebennytes 58 



ccording to 

Eusebius. 

Years. 
1st Dynasty of Thinite 

Kings 252 

2d of Thinites 297 

5d of Memphites ...198 

4th of Memphites ...448 

5th of Eiephanties ...248 

6th of Memphites . . .205 

7th of Memphites 75 days 

8th of Memphites ...100 

9th of Heracleots ...100 

10th of Heracleots ...185 

irth of Diospolites ... 43 

12th cf Diospolites ...245 

15th of Diospolites ...453 

14thofXoites 184 

15th of Diospolites ...250 

16th cf Thebans 196 

17th of Shepherds 508 

18th of Diospolites 548 

19th of Diospolites 194 

20th cf Diospolites 178 

21st of Tanites 150 

22d of Bubastites 49 

25d of Tanites 44 

24th of Sa'ites 44 

25th of Ethiopians 44 

26th of Sa'ites 168 

27th of Persians 120 

28th of Sa'ites 6 

29th of Mendesians ... 21 
50th of Sebennytes 20 



This comparison affords some very important hints, 
and may enable us to unravel the perplexities which 



* The kings of the eighteenth dynasty in the Old Chronicle 



*38 COMPARISON OF THE CHRONICLES. 

forms an important epoch in history, of which we 
these chronological fragments present to our first 
view. 

It shows, in the first place, that the first fifteen 
dynasties of Manethon correspond to the fifteen gene- 
rations of the Cynic Circle in the Old Chronicle. A 
more minute examination of Manethon's Chronicle 
will afford us reason to believe that the collective 
reigns of these fifteen dynasties ought to be com- 
prised in a: period nearly equal to the years of the 
Cynic Circle. 

Secondly, it appears, that although the whole 
period of time comprised by the Old Chronicle is so 
prodigious, yet that if we withdraw the reigns of 
Vulcan, the Sun, and the other gods, which seem 
rather to be the supplements of an astronomical cycle 
than historical dates, the remaining number of years 
is reduced to a moderate space. The commencement 
of the first dynasty of mortal kings, that is, of the first 
generation of the Cynic circle, will then fall within the 
limit of authentic history, or at least will not go far 
beyond it. 

Thirdly, the accession of the eighteenth dynasty 



are termed Memphitesj and in that of Manethon, Diospolites. 
Theie is, however, no contradiction between the two Chronicles 
in this instance; for Manethon himself informs us, in a passage 
that will be cited hereafter, that the princes of this race were 
kings of the Thebaid, who had driven out the Shepherds from 
Lower Egypt, and established their dominion over the whole 
country. They are called Diospolites, in reference to the first 
princes of the dynasty; and Memphites, with respect to the 
succeeding number. 



SERIES OF SYNCELLUS. *39 

have an opportunity of fixing the date from other 
sources. We are thus enabled to connect the whole 
series with authentic chronology ; and a minute exa- 
mination of the eighteenth and the twelve succeeding 
dynasties, which fall within the period when the 
Egyptian history becomes related to that of other 
nations, enables us to estimate what degree of regard 
the whole of these Chronicles deserves. These 
remarks are, however, thrown out merely by antici- 
pation ; and we require some further proof, before 
we are at liberty to adopt them. This proof 
will develope itself in the course of the following 
investigation. 

We shall now extract the series of Egyptian kings 
.which Syncellus has given, without assigning his 
authorities. 



SECTION VI. 
Series of Syncellus. 

Years. Years. 

1. Mestraim, or Mines, or 9. Amenemes 29 

Menes 35 10. Amosis 2 

2. Kouroudes 63 11. Akesepthres 13 

3. Aristarchus 34 12. Achoreus 9 

4. Spanius 36 13. Armi'yses 4 

5. * * * 1 14. Chamois 12 

6. * * * /' 15. Amesises 65 

7. Serapis 23 16. * * * 14 

8. Sesonchosis 49 17. Ouse 50 



*40 



SERIES OF SYNCELLUS. 



Years. 

18. Rameses 29 

19. Ramessomeoes .... 15 

20. Thysimares 31 

21. Ramsseseos 23 

22. Ramessemeno .... 19 
In his reign Abraham 

visited Egypt, says 
Syncellus. 

23. Ramesse, son of 
Baetes 39 

24. Ramesse, son of 
Ouaphres .. , 29 

25 Koncharis 6 

26. Silites .. 19 

27. Baion 43 

23. Apachnas 36 

29. Aphophis 41 

30. Sethos 50 

31. Kertus 29 

32. Aseth 24 

33. Amosis or Tethmosis 22 

34. Chebron* 13 

35. Amephes 15 

36. Amenses 11 

37. Misphragmouthosis .. 16 

38. Misphres 23 

39. Touthmosis 39 

40. Amenophthis 34 

41. Horus 48 

42. Achencheres 25 

43. Athoris 29 

44. Chencheres 26 

45. Acheres 8 or 30 

46. Armaios, or Danaus . . 9 
47- Ramesses, or iEgyptus 68 

48. Amenophis 8 

49. Thouoris 17 

50. Nechepsos 19 

51. Psammouthis 13 



Years. 

52. * * . * 4 

53. Kertus 20 

54. Rhampsis 45 

55. Amenses, called also 
Amenemes 26 

56. Ochyras 14 

57. Amedes 27 

58. Thouoris, or Polybus 50 

59. Athothes, or Phousa- 
nus 28 

60. Kenkenes 39 

61. Ouennephes 42 

62. Soussakeim, who over- 
came the Lybians, ^Ethi- 
opians, and Troglydytes, 
and all the country from 
Egypt to Jerusalem, 
which he plundered . . 34 

63. Psouenos 25 

64. Ammenophes ....... 9 

65. Nephecheres 6 

66. Saites 15 

67. Psinaches 9 

68. Petoubastes 44 

69. Osorthon 9 

70. Psammos 10 

71 . Koncharis 21 

72. Osorthon 15 

73. Takelophes 13 

74. Bocchoris 44 

75. Sabakon 12 

76. Sebechon 12 

77. Tarakes 20 

7S. Amaes 38 

79. Stephinathes 27 

SO. Nakepsos 13 

81. Nechaab 1 1 

82. Psammitichus 14 

83. Nechaab 2 9 



SYNCELLUS, HERODOTUS, AND DIODORUS. *4l 

Years. Years. 

S4. Psammouthis,orPsam- 88. Nepherites 6 

mitichus 2 17 89. Achoris 13 

85. Ouaphres 34 90. Psammouthis 2 

86. Amasis 50 91. Menas 4 

1 92. Nectanebes 2 

87* Amyrtaius 6 93. Teos 2, 

This series of kings reigned, according to Syncellus, from A. M. 
2900 to 5148, that is, in the computation of this chronologer, from 
2600 B. C. to 302 B. C. 



SECTION VII. 

Egyptian Chronology, according to Herodotus and Diodoras 

Sieidus. 

The series of Egyptian kings given by Herodotus 
agrees in the main with that of Diodorus, though 
they differ from each other in some particulars. This 
will be best illustrated by setting down the succes- 
sion according to each historian, in opposite columns. 
We shall first mention the great numbers, as we have 
them from both. 

Herodotus enumerates three generations or dynasties 
of gods, who reigned before Menes. The first were 
the Eight, or the elder gods. He has not mentioned 
the period of their reigns. It appears that they 
resigned the sceptre of Egypt about 17,000 years 
before Amasis, that is, before the Persian conquest, 
in B. C. 525. They were succeeded by the dynasty of 
the twelve younger gods, one of whom was Hercules. 



*42 



EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 



The twelve were followed by Osiris and the other 
gods of the third generation ; from whose reign, 
to Amasis, the Egyptians,, according to Herodotus, 
reckoned 15,000 years. 

Diodorus agrees with Herodotus pretty exactly 
in this piece of chronology. He says the gods 
and demigods reigned in Egypt almost 18,000 years. 
Orus was the last of them ; and after 
him mortal kings reigned 15,000 

The total number is 33,000 
This period terminates at the one hundred and 
eightieth Olympiad, during which Diodorus visited 
Egypt.* 

We now proceed to the mortal kings. 



According to Herodotus. 
1. Menes. 



* # * 



After Menes reigned succes- 
sively three hundred and 
thirty monarchs, of whom 
eighteen were Ethiopians, 
and one an Egyptian wo- 
man, and the only queen* 
named 

Nitocris 



According to Diodorus. 
1. Menis, or Mneves. 
Many generations after whom, 
Gnephachthus, father of Boc- 

choris the Wise, who led an 

army into Arabia. 

Fifty-two kings, who reigned 
1,400 years. After which 

Bousiris 

# # * 

Seven reigns. 

# # # 
Bousiris 2d 

A chasm in Diodorus's series. 

Osymandyas 

# # # 
Seven reigns. 



Diod. lib. i. cap. 4, 



ACCORDING TO HERODOTUS AND DIODORUS. 



43 



Years. 



Years. 



Ouchoreus 



Moiris, the 332d king 

Sesostris, the 333d 

Pheron, his son, 

who was succeeded by a 
Memphite citizen whom the 
Greeks call 



# * # 
Twelve reigns. 

# # * 
Myris 

* * * 
Six reigns 

# * # 
Sesoosis 

Sesoosis 2d, his son 

* * # 

Many generations. 

* # * 
Amosis, a tyrant 
Actisanes, an Ethiopian 
Menes. or Marus 



An interregnum of five gene- 
rations. 



Proteus 
Rhampsinitus, 
succeeded by 



Cheops, reigned 50 

Kephrenes 56 

Mycerinus 

Asychis 

Anysis 

Sabaco, an Ethiopian 

Anysis again 

Sethos, a priest of Vulcan 

Twelve kings -» 

Psammetichus alone / ** 

Necus, his son 17 

Psammis 6 

Apries 25 

Amasis 44 

The end of the reign of 
destruction of the indepe 



Ketes, or Proteus 
Remphis 



Six reigns. 



Nilus 

Chemmis, or Chembes . . 50 

Kephres 56 

Mycherinus, or Cherinus 
Bocchoris, a very wise prince 

Sabach, or Sabaco 

Anarchy for two years. 

Twelve kings 

Psammetichus alone 

* * * 
Five generations. 

* * » 
Apries 22 

Amasis 55 

Amasis is the epoch of the 
ndence of Egypt by the 



*44 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

conquest of Cambyses, and is a well-ascertained date 
in history. 

We shall now extract the relic preserved by 
Syncellus, of the Laterculus of Eratosthenes. 

Many names in this series are the same as those 
which occur in the succession detailed by Herodotus 
and Diodorus ; and they will assist us, in a very im- 
portant manner, in connecting the chronology of 
these writers with that of Manethon and the Old 
Chronicle. 



SECTION VIII. 

Remains of the Laterculus of Eratosthenes. 

KINGS OF THE THEBANS. 






Apollodorus, the chronologer," says Syncellus, 
has recorded another dynasty of Egyptian or 
Theban kings, as they are termed, consisting of 
thirty-eight princes, who reigned 1076 years. This 
catalogue was collected by Eratosthenes from Egyp- 
tian authorities by order of the kings, and written out 
by him in the Greek language/' 

Syncellus says that this series commences in the 
year of the world 2900, and terminates in 3976, that 
is, according to his computation, from 2600 to 1524. 
before Christ. 

Years. 

1. Mines Thebinites, interpreted Dionius 62 

2. Athothes Hermogenes 59 

3 . Athothes __ Hermogenes 32 



ACCORDING TO ERATOSTHENES. *45 

Years. 

4. Diabies, interpreted Philesteros, or Philetaerus 16 

5. Pemphos, which should be written Semphos, son of 
Athothes Heracleides 18 

6. Toigar Amachos Momcheiri, a Memphite, interpreted 
" A man with supernumerary limbs, or Tisandros Peris- 
someles" 79 

7. Stoichos, son of Toigar,— Mars Insensate 6 

8. Gosormies Eryrnfxvro; (evidently a corrupt 

reading : Scaliger reads AirYj<ri$ Ttavrw) 30 

9. Mares son of Gosormies, — Heliodorus, gift of the Sun . . 26 

10. Anoyphes Filius Communis 20 

11. Sirios (Siroes, Scalig.) — Gense filius, or according to others 
Abascantus, i. e. invidia carens 18 

12. Chnoubos Gneuros, — Aurese vel Aurei filius 22 

13. Rauosis Archicrater, or Robustorum princeps 13 

14. Biyris 10 

15. Saophis Comatus vel Negociator 29 

16. Sensaophis, that is, Saophis, 2 27 

17. Moscheris Heliodotus 31 

18. Mousthis 33 

19. Pammos Archondes 35 

20. Apappous* Maximus, reigned one hour less than 100 

21 . Achescos Ocaras 1 

22. Nitocris, a queen . . Minerva Victrix 6 

23. Myrtaios Ammonodotus 22 

24. Thyosimares (xpccrctio$ 6 svnv r t \io$, or probably 

6 sa-tiv rjXio$ xpccfq.ios, — idem sonat quod Sol. invictus . . 12 

25. Thinillus Qui auxit patrium imperium 8 

26. Semphroucratis. . . . Hercules Arpocrates 18 

27- Chouther Taurus tyrannus 7 

28. Meures Philoscorus, i. e. philosophus ? 12 

29. Chomaephtha .... Mundus Philephsestus 11 



* Apappous is interpreted Msyi<rto$ } referring, perhaps, to the 
stature of this king. Apophis was an Egyptian giant, accord- 
ing to Plutarch. This seems to be the name of which the 
Greeks made Epaphus. 



*46 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

Years. 

30. Ancounios Ochy, interpreted Tyrannus 60 

31. Penteathyris* 16 

32. Stamenemes 2 23 

33. Sistosichermes Herculis robur 55 

34. Maris 43 

35. Siph6as,f Hermes Vulcani filius 5 

36. * * * 14 

37. Phrouron Nilus 5 

38. Amouthantaios 63 



The foregoing list was obtained by Eratosthenes, 
from the sacred scribes of Thebes or Diospolis. 

Syncellus supposes the last king to have ascended 
the throne in A.M. 3913, that is 1587 years before 
Christ. Fifty-three other names were inserted in 
the catalogue of Apollodorus, who succeeded him. 
These Syncellus has omitted. 

It is probable that Eratosthenes had continued his 
chronicle down to his own time, for this was the 
common practice of chronologers in that age. It is 
further to be supposed, unless we mean to impute a 
fraud to Syncellus, a suspicion for which there is no 
ground, that this compiler obtained the date he has 
given for the termination of this series of kings, by 
computing upwards from the time of the Ptolemies 

* Penteathyris is evidently P'hont Athyri, the high-priest 
of Athyri. Some of the kings were named simply after the 
gods, as several in this catalogue. So Thouoris, seems to be 
Thoucris, who was an Egyptian goddess. 

f Siphoas, Hermes, Vulcani filius. Jablonski proves 
that we ought to read Siphthas, or rather Saphtha, and that 
Hermes was the Egyptian name, with a Greek termination, 
and not a part of the Greek interpretation of the name 
Siphtha. 



ACCORDING TO ERATOSTHENES. *47 

the reigns of the last fifty-three princes, as originally 
set down by Eratosthenes. This being the case, if, 
to 1524, the period which intervened between the 
demise of the last king in the series and the Christian 
era, we add 1075, the sum total of all the reigns, from 
Menes to Amouthantaios (according to Syncellus's way 
of computing it, for the numbers in reality amount 
only to 1055) we shall obtain 2662 years before 
Christ, for the date of the accession of Menes, the 
first king of Egypt, according to Eratosthenes. This 
calculation, however, proceeds on the supposition that 
Syncellus has given us a faithful transcript, and has 
accuratelv reckoned the total numbers. 



PART II. 

ANALYSIS OP THE FOREGOING DOCUMENTS* 

SECTION I. 

Preliminary Observations. 

We shall now enter upon the attempt to elicit order 
from this assemblage of confused and contradictory 
documents. Nothing can be more discouraging than 
the first survey of the fragments we have extracted.* 
A nearer scrutiny will, however, discover many marks 
of agreement and mutual confirmation ; and as the 
discrepancy is too great to allow us to regard these 
coincidences as the effect of design, we shall thus 
obtain a proof that the antiquity of Egypt rests on 
foundation of authentic memorials. 

* When I first examined these fragments, with a view of 
computing from them the Egyptian chronology, they appeared 
to me to be an inextricable tissue of error and contradiction. 
I repeated my attempt several times, at intervals, before I 
obtained the smallest hope of success, or a ray of light to 
guide me through the labyrinth. At length I thought I 
discovered a clue, which I have followed, and have persuaded 
myself that it has enabled me to unravel the mystery. 

h 



50* ANALYSIS OF THE FRAGMENTS 

The method we shall follow in the investigation of 
this subject is,, to begin with the later dynasties, 
which fall within the era of general history. After 
the erection of the Persian monarchy, and even for 
some ages before that era, from the period when the 
Greeks became a powerful maritime people, the 
affairs of different nations are more within the sphere 
of our acquaintance than during the earlier times. 
The annals of Greece become now pretty well fixed, 
by means of the Olympic register ; and those of the 
East, by the succession of Assyrian kings, in Pto- 
lemy's Canon. By comparing those fragments of 
history, which refer to these later ages, we obtain 
an insight into the methods of the Egyptian chrono- 
logers, and learn how far they can be trusted in the 
darker regions of antiquity. 

Our chief dependance must be, throughout this 
analysis, on historical synchronisms. It is not by 
taking up either of the successions as above copied 
from the old authors, and by adding up all the years 
from the beginning to the end, that we shall make out 
any agreement between them. Their accuracy will 
not bear such a test as this. In each, however, 
we shall find some particular names and dates which 
coincide with some of the names and dates in other 
tables. These we must take as fixed points, on which 
the whole of our machinery must hinge ; from these we 
compute upwards and downwards, and if we find too 
long a succession of reigns in any list intervening 
between two eras well ascertained, they must be 
considered as interpolated, if it appears that the dates 
originally corresponded. 

It has been through the want of attention to this 



OF EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY. *51 

rule of proceeding that so many authors have been 
led into error, and have failed to elucidate these 
fragments of chronology. 



SECTION II. 

Dates of the Egyptian Chronology computed upwards, from 
the Persian conquest to the accession of Psammitichus. 

The twenty-sixth dynasty, both in the Old Chro- 
nicle and in that of Mauethon, terminates with the 
conquest of Egypt by Cambyses. This epoch we shall 
regard as the conclusion of the Egyptian chronology. 
It is a fixed point in history, concerning which all 
chronologers are agreed. Accordingly, we shall take 
no concern about the succeeding part of any of these 
records. We have only to dispose of the first 
twenty-six dynasties. 

The Persian conquest happened in the year before 
Christ 525.* From this period we commence our 
reckoning, and compute upwards towards the more 
obscure ages. 

* Amasis died, according to Diodorus, in the third year of 
the sixty-third Olympiad, while Cambyses was making prepa- 
rations for invading Egypt, and was succeeded by his son 
Psammenitus, who reigned only six months. Diodor. lib. i. 
All chronologers agree in this date. See Prideaux's Con- 
nection of the Old and New Testament, vol. i. Usher's 
Chronologia Veteris Testamenti. 



*52 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

The longest reign in the twenty-sixth dynasty is 
that of Psammitichus, who was one of the earliest 
princes. Herodotus says that he reigned in Egypt 
fifty-four years, and with this number Africanus 
agrees. From the time of Psammitichus, the 
Greeks had constant intercourse with Egypt, and 
from this era, to that of the Persian conquest, the 
succession of reigns is set down with an exact 
reckoning of years by Herodotus. 

Several of the intermediate princes are also men- 
tioned in our sacred Scriptures, and the dates of their 
reigns are ascertained by events recorded in other 
histories. On these accounts we may consider the 
Egyptian chronology of the intervening period as 
settled by authentic memorials. 

The following is a tabular view of this succession : 



According to 


According to 


According to 


According to 


Herodotus. 


Jul. Africanus. 


Eusebius. 


Syncellus. 


Years. 


Years. 


Years. 


Years. 


Psammitichus 


Psammitichus 


Psammitichus 


Psammitichus 


reigned 54 


reigned 54 


reigned 45 


reigned 44 



Nekus 1 Nechao II 6 Nechao IT 6 Nechaab 9 

Psammis 6 Psammouthis... 6 Psammouthis... 17 Psamoutis 17 

Apries 25 Quaphris 19 Ouaphris 25 Ouaphris 34 

Amasis 44 Amosis 44 Amosis 42 Amasis 50 

Add... 525 

671* 

Herodotus says, that Necus, whom Manethon calls 
Nechao, defeated the Syrians at Magdolum, and 

* There is some confusion in the numbers given by 
Manethon's transcribers, which appears to have arisen from 
carelessness in copying. In some instances the lengths of 
succeeding reigns are reversed. It seems tolerably evident 
that in this succession the copies of Manethon originally 
agreed exactly with Herodotus. 



FROM CAMBYSES UPWARDS. *53 

gained possession of the town of Cadytis, which he 
describes as a city in the mountains of Palestine, 
equal in extent to Sardis. This city is doubtless 
Jerusalem, and the battle of Magdolum, is the battle 
of Megiddo, at which Pharaoh Necho killed Josiah, 
the king of Judah, after which he gained possession 
of Jerusalem, and raised Jehoiakim to the vacant 
throne. The death of kin^ Josiah is fixed in the 
scriptural chronology, about the year 607 B. C. 
which falls within the reign of Necus, as dated by 
Herodotus and Manethon, and this agreement confirms 
the credit of these historians. 

Secondly, Apries, or Ouaphris, according to Hero- 
dotus, made war against Tyre and Sidon. He was 
engaged in the affairs of Syria. Accordingly we hear 
of him in Scripture, under the name of Hophra. 
Zedekiah, the last king of Judah, relying on the 
assistance of Pharaoh Hophra, revolted from Nebu- 
chadnezzar, king of Babylon. This was the same 
Egyptian prince who was threatened by the prophet 
Ezechiel. 

The destruction of Jerusalem by the king of Baby- 
lon, which, according to the sacred historians, 

Herodotus says that Psammitichus reigned fifteen years 
jointly with eleven other chieftains, and afterwards acquired 
the sole command. Some writers have imagined that the 
fifty-four years of his reign comprised only the period of bis 
single administration, and add fifteen years to compute the 
date of his accession jointly with the eleven other chiefs. But 
the most obvious meaning of Herodotus is against this supposi- 
tion, and it is contradicted by the circumstances of the history, 
and by the tables of Manethon, as we shall observe on 
examining the preceding part of the twenty-sixth dynasty. 



*54 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

happened during the reign of Hophra, is fixed by the 
scriptural chronology in the year B. C. 586,, and this 
date falls within the reign of Ouaphris, as computed 
Herodotus and Manethon. 

These coincidences prove that we may depend on 
the accuracy of our chronicles in this part of their 
record. We shall therefore regard the death of 
Psamrnitichus in B. C. 617, and the commencement 
of his reign in B. C. 671, as dates well ascertained. 



SECTION III. 

Dates of Egyptian Chronology computed upwards, from 
Psamrnitichus, to the period when Egypt became subject to 
Ethiopian kings. 

It appears, from the agreement of several historians, 
that at a period not very long preceding the reign 
of Psamrnitichus, the throne of Egypt had fallen into 
the possession of the Ethiopians. "Herodotus assigns 
to Sabbaco, the Ethiopian monarch of Egypt, a reign 
of fifty years ; but the account of this prince, in the 
narrative of the Greek historian, is accompanied by 
circumstances which prove that there is some mistake 
in this number. Manethon 's chronicle, as preserved 
by Eusebius, assigns to him only twelve years, and 
gives forty-four to the whole Ethiopian dynasty, con- 
sisting of three kings. 

That the Ethiopians had at this time possession of 
Egypt, we might learn from the record of the history 



FROM PSAMMITICHUS UPWARDS. *55 

of Israel. For we read in it that Sennacherib, the 
Assyrian,, carried on war with the Ethiopian king 
called Tirhakah; and there is no probable way in 
which the arms of the Ethiopians could come into 
contest with those of the Assyrians, unless we 
suppose that the Ethiopians had gained possession 
of Egypt, and had thence attempted to add Palestine 
to their possessions, a country which was always an 
object of strife between the rulers of Egypt and 
Syria. 

Strabo mentions an Ethiopian prince, whom he calls 
Tearchon, and reports to have been a great conqueror. 
It has been conjectured by Usher, with great proba- 
bility, that this Tearchon was the Tirhakah above 
mentioned. 

The last prince of the Ethiopian dynasty, according 
to Manethon, was Tarakos, and his reign, if we com- 
pute upwards from the accession of Psammitichus, 
coincides with the age assigned to Tirhakah by the 
Hebrew scriptures. There can scarcely be a doubt 
that these are two names for the same prince : in fact, 
they only differ in the method of expressing oriental 
words in European orthography. 

We shall bring this succession into a tabular form, 
beginning with the twenty-fourth dynasty. 



According to 


According to 


According to 


According to 


Euscbius. 


Africa mis. 


Synccllus. 


Herodotus. 


Years. 


Years. 


Years. 




occhoris the 


Bocchoris the 


Bocchoris 


Anysis, a blind man 


Saite reigned 44 


Saite reigned 6 


reigned 44 





*56 



EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 



XXV. Dynasty of XXV. Dynasty of 
Ethiopians. Ethiopians. 

Sabbakon 12 Sabbakon 8 Sabakon 12 Sabakon the 

Ethiop 50 

Anysis restored. 

Tarakos 20 Tarkos 18 Tarakos 20 Sethon,* a priest 

of Vulcan. 



Seuechos . 



12 Seuechos 14 Sebechon 



44 



49 



14 



49 



XXVI. Dynasty XXVI. Dynasty 
of Saites. of Saites. 

Ammeres 12 Stephinates 7 Amaes 58 

Stephanathis ... 7 Nechepsos 6 Stephinathis ... 27 

Nechepsos 6 Nechao 8 Nachepsos 13 

Nechao 9 Psammitichus... Nechaab 1 8 

Psammitichus Psammitichus 

33 



* That the Sethon of Herodotus was contemporary with the 
Tarakos of Manethon, may easily be proved. Sethon was 
reigning at the time when Sennacherib experienced his cele- 
brated defeat. The reign of Sennacherib was very short ; it 
began in the twelfth, and ended in the fifteenth year of 
Hezekiah. It was, therefore, within the period of Sethon's 
reign. 

Now Sennacherib was engaged in a war with an Ethiopian 
king. But the last of the Ethiopian kings in Egypt was 
Tarakos ; after him the dynasty was removed. The reign of 
Tarakos is, therefore, the last epoch to which we can assign 
the expedition of Sennacherib, and the number of years laid 
down by Manethon, between the reign of Nechao, or Pharaoh 
Necho, and the Ethiopian dynasty, will not allow us to 
remove the date of this event further back. Tarakos the 
Ethiopian was, therefore, ruler of Egypt in the time of 
Sennacherib; though the Egyptian priests seem to have led 
Herodotus to suppose that the crown was then on the head of 
one of their own order. Perhaps the high priest of Vulcan 
was nominally king, while the royal power and the command 
of the armies were vested in the Ethiopian chief, who is, 
therefore, reckoned among the kings, in the most accurate 
table of this succession. 



from psammitichus upwards. *57 

Now, since S3 4- 671 =701, the end of the reign of 
Tarakos, and of the Ethiopian dynasty, happened in 
the year B. C. 701, and their accession in 721. The 
war of Sennacherib the Assyrian against Tirhakah 
took place in the 1 4th or 15th year of the reign of 
Hezekiah, viz. B. C. 710; and thus we find that 
the scriptural date of Tirhakah's expedition falls 
within the period set down by Manethon for the 
reign of Tarakos. 

This war of Tirhakah against Sennacherib is 
remarkable for a celebrated event, which is recorded 
by the sacred and profane writers in different ways, 
but by both is mentioned as miraculous. Sennacherib, 
in his march against the Ethiopian king, meditated 
an attack upon Jerusalem, then governed by the pious 
Hezekiah. It was on this occasion that the army of 
the Assyrian king was destroyed in the night by an 
angel of the Lord, and Jerusalem miraculously saved. 
Herodotus also relates the expedition of Sennacherib 
against Egypt, which was at that time governed by a 
prince, called by the historian Sethon, who was a 
priest of Vulcan, and was hated by the Egyptian 
army. The priest, being deserted by his soldiery, 
prayed to his god, and was answered by a dream, in 
which he was commanded to march boldly and attack 
the Assyrian army. He proceeded at the head of a 
few labourers and mechanics, and obtained an easy 
victory ; for, in the depth of the night, a swarm of rats 
had been sent by Vulcan to gnaw the bow-strings of 
the Assyrian soldiers. There is scarcely a doubt 
that these relations belong to the same event. 

Another king of Egypt is mentioned in the Scrip- 
tures by the name of So, with whom Hoshea, king 



*58 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

of Israel, entered into a secret alliance against 
Shalmaneser, the Assyrian, the predecessor of Senna- 
cherib. In consequence of this treaty, the Assyrians 
laid siege to Samaria, and carried the ten tribes of 
Israel into captivity. This alliance between Hoshea 
and So was made about 725 B. C. a date which falls 
within the reign of Sevechus ; and it hence appears 
that So was the second prince of the Ethiopian 
dynasty. 

The result is that the subjugation of Egypt by the 
Ethiopians, or the union of the Egyptian and Ethi- 
opian crowns, must be dated in the year 745 B. C. 



SECTION IV. 

Of the Four Dynasties which preceded the Ethiopian Conquest, 
viz. the 2\st, 22d, 23d, and 24th. 

The following is a comparative table of the suc- 
cession of these dynasties, according to Eusebius, 
Africanus, and Syncellus. 



ACCORDING TO ACCORDING TO ACCORDING TO 

EUSEBIUS. AFRICANUS. SYNCELLUS. 

Twenty-first Dynasty of Twenty-first Dynasty of 

Tanites. Tanites. 

Years. Years. Years. 

Smendes 26 Smedes 26 Soussakeim 34 

Psousennes 41 Phousenes 46 Psouenos 25 

Nephercheres 4 Nephelcheres 4 

Ammenephthis 9 Amenopthis 9 Ammenophes 9 

Osochor 6 Osochor 6 Nephecheres 6 

Psinaches 6 Psinaches 9 Saites 5 

Psousennes 2 35 Psousennes 30 Psinaches 9 

Total.. 7l30 Total... 130 Total... 98 



FROM SABBACON UPWARDS. *59 

Twenty-second Dynasty of Twenty-second Dynasty of 
JBoubastites. Boubastites. 

Years. Years. Years. 

Sesonchosis 21 Sesonchis 21 Potoubastes 9 

Osorthon 15 Osoreth 15 Osorthon 44 

Takellothis 15 Three anon yrnous kings 25 

Takellothis 13 

Three anonymous kings 42 

Total... 49 Total... 116 Total... 53 



Twenty -third Dynasty of Twenty -third Dynasty of 
Tonites. Tanites. 

Potoubastes 25 Potoubates 40 Koncharis 13 

Osorthon 9 Osorthon 8 Osorthon 15 

Psammos 10 Psammos 10 Takelophes 21 

Zet 31 



Twenty-fourth Dynasty of Tioenty-fourth Dynasty of 

one Saite. one Saite. 
Bocchoris 44 Bocchoris 6 Bocchoris 44 

Total of 25d and 24th 

Dynasties 88 95 



In computing the reigns of these dynasties, we 
shall follow Eusebius, whose copy of Manethon 
agrees best with the table of Syncellus, and is 
without those chasms which interrupt the continuity 
of succession in that of Africanus. 



The 21st dynasty 130 

22d dynasty 49 

23d dynasty 44 

24th dynasty 44 

Total.. 267 



We shall thus place the commencement of the 
twenty-first dynasty, 267 years before Sabbacon, who 



*60 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 

began to reign in B. C. 745. Now, 745+267= 1012, 
and the commencement of the twenty -first dynasty 
will therefore be fixed in the year 1012 B.C.; and 
the first king, Smedes, or Soussakeim, as he is called 
by Syncellus, reigned until 986 B. C. 

It thus becomes probable that Syncellus was cor- 
rect in his conjecture that this Soussakeim was the 
Shishak of the Hebrews. The invasion of Judaea by 
Shishak may be dated, according to a computation 
which follows the chronology of the Scriptures,* in 
the year B. C. 985 ; which is one year after the death 
of Smedes, according to Africanus ; and an error of 
a single year may, in this case, be regarded as a 
remarkable instance of accuracy.f 



SECTION. V. 

We now proceed to the nineteenth and twentieth 
dynasties, considering the accession of the twenty- 
first in B. C. 1012 as an established date. 



* See Note B. 

f The name of the next king, Psousennes, also bears some 
resemblance to Soussakeim, or Sisak. 



FROM SOUSSAKEIM UPWARDS. *61 

AFRICANUS. EUSEBIUS. SYNCELLUS. 

Years. Years. Years. 

Twentieth Dynasty, Twentieth Dynasty, 

consisting of twelve consisting of twelve 

Diospolite kings, Diospolite kings, . 

reigned 178 reigned 135 



Entirely lost. Entirely lost. Phousanos 28 

Kenkenes, or Athothes 59 

* * * * * 

Ouennephes 42 

* * * * * ■ ' 

Total... 109 



This dynasty being wholly lost in the copies of 
Africanus and Eusebius, we cannot depend on the 
sums total assigned to the collective reigns. I 
follow the number given by Africanus, whose tables 
are most accurate and complete in the early 
dynasties., and date the accession of this dynasty 
at 1012+135=1147 B.C. 

NINETEENTH DYNASTY. 

Thouoris 17 

Nekepsos 19 

Psammouthis 15 

4 

1 Sethos 55 Sethos , 51 Kertos 20 

Rhapses 66 Rhapsakes 61 Rhampsis 45 

Ammenephthes 40 Ammenephthes 20 Amenemes 26 

Ammenemmes 26 Rammeses 60 Ochyras 14 

Thouoris, the Polybus of Ammenemnes 5 Arnedes 27 

Homer ,.... 7 Thouoris, or Polybus ... 7 Thouoris, or Polybus ..50 

Total... 194 Total... 204 



In this instance the table of Africanus is more com- 
plete than that of Eusebius, who seems to have omitted 
one reign, viz. that of Rammeses. This king is men- 
tioned by Josephus as the son of Amenephthes, or 
Amenophis, and therefore his name originally stood 



*62 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY COMPUTED 

in the series. 1147 + 204 give 1351 BC. as the 
date of the accession of Sethos. If we follow Euse- 
bius, this date must be reduced ten years. 

The last king of this dynasty is Thouoris, who, 
according to Manethon, was the king of Diospolis, 
said by Homer to have entertained Menelaus; 
he is, by that poet, named Polybus. Consequently, 
we are here near to the era of the Trojan war, which, 
according to the computation of Eratosthenes, and 
other old chronologers, happened in the year 1183 
B.C.* That date falls in the reign of Rammeses, 
the fourth Diospolitan king in the above list of Afri- 
canus. Now, it is remarkable that Pliny, who can 
scarcely be supposed to have made reference in this 
point to the tables of Manethon, has recorded that 
Troy was taken in the reign of an Egyptian king, 
named Ramises. We have thus obtained an unex- 
pected confirmation of the authenticity of these 
memorials. 

The accession of the nineteenth dynasty, which 
must be fixed in the year 1353 if we follow Africa- 
nus, and ten years later if we follow the tables of 
Eusebius, is one of the most important epochs in the 
Egyptian history. The first king, named Sethos, 
or Sethosis, is the Sesostris of Herodotus, and the 
Sesoosis of Diodorus Siculus. This we learn from 
the account given of his exploits by Josephus. 

This date of the reign of Sesostris corresponds 
very nearly with the period assigned to him by 
Larcher, who has computed from the data afforded 
by Herodotus, without making any reference to the 
dynasties of Manethon. 

* Refer to Note C. 









UPWARDS TO THE EIGHTEENTH DYNASTY. *63 

We may observe that this is the most probable 
period in history for the existence of such a conqueror, 
viz. about two centuries before the Trojan war. If 
he had lived in later times, the historians of Greece 
could scarcely have failed to receive some notice 
of him among the nations he subdued. 



SECTION V. 

The Eighteenth Dynasty, and the Period of the Exode. 

The eighteenth dynasty is a very long and a very 
important one. The termination of its reign imme- 
diately precedes the conqueror Sesostris, the date of 
whose accession we have fixed at 1350 years B.C. 
Its commencement is connected with the departure 
of the Shepherd kings from Egypt. The succession 
of kings belonging to this dynasty is found in a 
tolerably complete catalogue, in the extracts from 
the works of Manethon given by Josephus, and in 
the chronological compilations of Julius Africanus, 
Eusebins, and Syncellus. It is as follows. 



*64 EGYPTIAN CHRONOLOGY 



AFRICANUS. EUSEEIUS. JOSEPHUS. 

Years. Years. Ys. M#. 

Amosis ** Amosis .., 25 Tethmosis . 25 4 

Chcbros 13 Chebron 13 Chebron 13 

Amenophthis , 21 Ammenophis 21 Amenophis 2d 7 

Amersis 22 Amesses 21 9 

Misaphris 13 Miphris 12 Mephres t 12 9 

Misphragmuthosis 26 Misphragmuthosis 26 Misphragmuthosis 21 10 

Touthmosis 9 Touthmosis 9 Thmosis 9 8 

Amenophis, or Mem- Amenophis 31 Amenophis 30 10 

non 31 

Horus 37 Horus 36 Orus 36 5 

Acherres 32 Achencherses 12 Akenchres 12 1 

Rathos 6 Athoris 39 Rathosis 9 

Chebres 12 Chencheres 16 Achencheres 12 5 

Acherres 8 

Acherres 2 12 Cherres 15 Achencheres 12 3 

Armeses 5 Armes, or Danaus 5 Armais, or Danaus 4 

Rammesses..... J. Ammeses, or iEgyptus 68 Ramesses, oriEgyp- 

tus 1 4 

Harmesses Miamun 66 2 
Amenoph 19 Menophis 40 Amenophis 19 6 

Sum total, 265 348 328 11 

Corrected sum, 259 376 



The table of reigns in the extract by Josephus is 
evidently the most exact, and we shall follow him in 
his computation as far as it extends. The number of 
years assigned to this dynasty by Josephus is 328, 
and eleven months, which we shall call 329 years. 
Now, if we add this period to the date above men- 
tioned, of 1350, we obtain 1659 for the commence- 
ment of the eighteenth dynasty. This is very near 
the Scriptural date of the .exode of the Israelites from 
Egypt ; and the synchronism of this event with the 
departure of the Shepherd kings leads us to some 
interesting inquiries and conclusions. 



THE EIGHTEENTH DYNASTY AND THE HYCSOS. *65 

Josephus considered the Shepherds who possessed 
Egypt as the Israelites, and he does not betray the 
least suspicion that Manethon intended to describe 
any other people by that name. Most of the moderns, 
except Perizonius, have been of a different opinion. 
As this is a question of great importance in the 
Egyptian history, we shall take some pains to 
determine it. 

In the Letter of Josephus to Apion we find a con- 
siderable fragment of the second book of Manethon, 
containing a history of the Shepherd kings which seems 
to have been extracted, nearly in its entire state, from 
the Egyptian Chronicles of that historian. These 
Chronicles appear to have been a compilation from 
different sources.* The author professed to have 
taken this part of it, as Josephus informs us, from 
the sacred and authentic records of his country. The 
following is a translation of those passages which are 
most important to our present purpose. 



History of the Invasion of Egypt by the Shepherds, from 
Manethon. 

cc There was a king of Egypt, whose name was 
Timaus, in whose time it pleased God, I know not on 
what account, to afflict us with calamities ; and a 
tribe of people, of mean origin, entered our country 
from the East with unexpected boldness, and easily 
gained possession of it without fighting a battle. 

* This appears even from the title of the Old Chronicle in 
-Eusebius's Canon. 

ft 



*66 HISTORY OP THE HYCSOS 

Having brought the princes of the country into sub- 
jection to their power, they barbarously burnt the 
towns, and destroyed the temples of our gods. They 
exercised the utmost atrocity towards the native inha- 
bitants, patting the males to the sword, and reducing 
their wives and children to slavery. At length they 
chose a king from their own people, whose name was 
Salatis ; and who, residing at Memphis, held all the 
upper and lower Egypt tributary, and placed garri- 
sons in all the important places. He provided chiefly 
for the security of the eastern frontier, apprehending 
that the Assyrians, who were then very powerful and 
ambitious, might make an attempt to get possession of 
the kingdom ; and, having found a city conveniently 
situated for his purpose in the Sai'tic nome, on the 
eastern side of the river of Bubastos, which, from some 
theological fable, had the name of Auaris, he made a 
settlement there; and having strongly fortified it, 
placed in it a garrison of two hundred and forty 
thousand men. There he held his residence in the 
summer, partly that he might have an opportunity of 
measuring out corn and paying his people their wages, 
and partly that, by frequently exercising his troops, he 
might keep strangers in awe of his power. This 
chief reigned nineteen years, and was succeeded by 
another, whose name was Baion, and who reigned 
forty-four years. Afterwards Apachnas reigned 
thirty-six years and seven months ; his successor, 
Apophis, sixty-one years; Janias, fifty years and one 
month ; and lastly, Assis, forty-nine years and two 
months. These six princes, who were the first rulers 
of the Shepherds, carried on continual war, and 
endeavoured to destroy the name and nation of Egypt. 



OR SHEPHERD KINGS. *67 

Their whole race was called Hycsos, which means 
Shepherd Kings; for Hyc t in the sacred language, 
signifies a king ; and Sos, in the vulgar idiom, means 
a shepherd or shepherds ; and thus the name Hycsos 
is composed. Some say that they were a tribe of 
Arabs." (i But in another copy of Manethon," adds 
Josephus, " I find that Hyc does not signify kings, 
but that the Shepherds are distinguished by this ap- 
pellation as captives ; for Hyc, or. Hac, with an aspirate, 
is the term for captive, in the Egyptian language ; 
and this interpretation/' he adds, " is the most pro- 
bable, and the most consistent with ancient history." 
" These kings above-mentioned/' continues Mane- 
thon, " of the people called Shepherds, and their 
posterity, held Egypt under their sway about five 
hundred and eleven years. After this period the 
Egyptian kings in the Thebaid and other parts of the 
country revolted from the yoke of the Shepherds, and 
a severe and obstinate contest was carried on between 
them." It is added that, " under a king whose name 
was Alisphragmuthosis, the Shepherds were reduced,, 
defeated, and driven out of the rest of Egypt, and 
shut up in a place containing ten thousand acres of 
land ; the name of which was Avaris." " This 
place," says Manethon, cc the Shepherds fortified 
with a strong and lofty wall for the security of their 
possessions and spoil; but Thouthmosis, the sou of 
Alisphragmuthosis, laid siege to the fortress with an 
army of four hundred and eighty thousand men, and 
attempted to take it by force; but at length giving 
up this hope, entered into a compact with the be- 
sieged, that they should leave Egypt and depart 
without molestation whithersoever they chose. These 



*68 HISTORY OF THE HYCSOS 

people accordingly, in consequence of their engage- 
ment, departed from Egypt with their whole families 
and all their possessions, in number not less than two 
hundred and forty thousand men, and travelled 
through the wilderness towards Syria; but, fearing 
the Assyrians, who were then powerful in Asia, built 
a city in the country, which is now called Judaea, 
sufficiently ample to contain this multitude of people, 
and gave to their city the name of Jerusalem. " 
Josephus mentions, in another place, that Manethon 
had recorded the conquest of Judaea by these exiles, 
and added that they settled in Jerusalem, and built 
the temple : all which information he drew from the 
sacred records of Egypt. 

" In another work on the Egyptian affairs/' says 
Josephus, iC Manethon informs us that these same 
Shepherds are called Captives in their own sacred 
books; in which assertion he is correct; for, as the 
feeding of sheep was the employment of our fore- 
fathers in remote times, and they are rightly called 
Shepherds, as leading a nomadic life, so they were 
also not unaptly termed ' Captives/ since our an- 
cestor Joseph declared to the Egyptian king that he 
was his captive, and afterwards sent for his brethren 
to him into Egypt, by the permission of the 
sovereign." 

From this relation, which Josephus professes to cite 
verbatijn from the works of Manethon, it is evident 
that the Egyptian historian considered the Shepherds as 
the Israelites; and though some of the circumstances 
he relates respecting them are fictitious, yet it may 
be supposed that others are founded on facts which 
Moses has passed over in silence. If we consider 



EXPELLED BY TETHMOSIS. *69 

the numbers of the Twelve Tribes when they quitted 
Egypt, after suffering 1 so long from the cruel perse- 
cution of Pharoah, who caused all their male children 
to be drowned, and estimate their probable number 
before these calamities, it can scarcely be supposed 
that so great a multitude would submit to be enslaved 
without resistance; and if they met with a temporary 
success, they probably treated the Egyptians and their 
superstitions with no great degree of lenity. We 
have, indeed, no reason to suppose that the Israelites 
ever raised one of their own nation to the throne of 
Egypt; but while they lived apart in Goshen, which, 
as it will presently appear, was the district that is called 
Auaris, they probably had rulers of their own ; and these 
rulers would naturally be considered by the Egyp- 
tians, who were ignorant of their manners, as kings. 
The kings of the Shepherds are not represented by 
Manethon as regular sovereigns of Egypt, but as 
exercising a tyrannical government over the country; 
while the native princes continued to reign in the 
Thebaid and other districts, and at length were able 
to combine their forces with sufficient strength to 
regain their authority, and to reduce the Shepherds to 
slavery or exile. The employment of the Shepherd 
kings in Auaris or Goshen, viz. the distribution of corn, 
is a curious circumstance ; but the concluding part of 
the narrative, the compact for the departure from 
Egypt, their march through the wilderness, the vast 
number of the emigrant horde, and the foundation of 
the temple and city of Jerusalem, seem to prove 
beyond doubt that the Israelites are here described. 

Besides the history of the invasion of the Shepherds 
in the reign of Timaus, and their expulsion in that cf 



*!0 HISTORY OF THE HYCSOS 

Tethmosis, Manethon had interwoven in his work an 
account of a second conquest of Egypt by the same 
people, which he dates in the reign of Amenophis. 
This latter story is in many respects a repetition of 
the former. Josephus asserts, as if from Manethon's 
own confession, that the first is a genuine piece of 
history, derived from the ancient records, and that 
the second was adopted by the historian from 
some work of uncertain authority. We shall find 
reason to believe that this assertion is not without 
foundation. In the first place we shall find that this 
last story, connected by Manethon with the time of 
Amenophis, is referred by several other historians of 
the Ptolemaic age to the reigns of different kings, 
and that it is related with a great variety of circum- 
stances. Secondly, the latter narative so nearly 
corresponds with the former in all the remarkable 
particulars, that it is easy to discover the two stories 
to be only different representations of the same oc- 
currence. Every principal fact in the first account 
is repeated in the second, with the addition of some 
incidents evidently fabulous. As it is of great impor- 
tance to elucidate this portion of Egyptian history, I 
shall translate from Josephus this second fragment of 
Manethon. 

" This king Amenophis," says Manethon, cc was 
desirous of being admitted tobeholdthegods,asHorus, 
one of his predecessors, had been; and he communi- 
cated this desire to the son of Papis, named also 
Amenophis; who was supposed, on account of his 
wisdom and knowledge of futurity, to partake of 
the divine nature. By the latter he was assured that 
his desire would be granted if he would cause the 



EXPELLED BY AMENOPHIS. *7l 

whole country to be purified from lepers and polluted 
persons. The king, pleased with this information, 
caused all those who had any bodily infirmity to be 
collected from all parts of Egypt, to the number of 
eighty thousand men, and sent them to labour in the 
quarries, which are situated to the eastward of the 
Nile, in order that they might be separated from the 
remainder of the Egyptian people. It happened, 
however, that among the exiles there were some of 
the sacerdotal scribes, who were infected with the 
leprosy; and the prophet Amenophis, fearing lest 
the wrath of the gods might on this account fall upon 
himself and the king, uttered a prediction, that certaiu 
strangers should come to the aid of the polluted 
people, and should conquer Egypt, and keep it in 
subjection thirteen years. Not having courage to 
announce these calamities to the king, Amenophis 
slew himself, after committing his prophecy to writ- 
ing.'' Manethon continues to relate that, " after the 
infected people had submitted a long time to the 
laborious works allotted to them in the quarries, they 
entreated the king to relieve them. The latter granted 
them permission to reside in the city of Auaris, which 
was then vacant, having been abandoned by the 
Shepherds. This town, according to the ancient 
mythology of Egypt, was one of the Typhonian 
cities. The lepers having entered the place, and find- 
ing that it afforded them facilities for a revolt, chose a 
priest of Heliopolis, named Osarsiph, to be their ruler, 
and bound themselves by oath to obey all his com- 
mands. He ordained, in the first place, that they 
should neither worship the gods nor abstain from 
any of the animals which were regarded as sacred by 



*72 



HISTORY OF THE HYCSOS 



the Egyptians, but kill and eat all of them indiffer- 
ently ; and that they should form no connexions out 
their own community. Having enacted these laws, and 
many others, altogether contrary to the institutions of 
Egypt, he ordered them to fortify their city, and pre- 
pare for war against Amenophis, while he received 
into his party some other priests and polluted persons, 
and sent them as ambassadors to Jerusalem, to the 
Shepherds, who had been expelled by Tethmosis. 
He informed these people of the circumstances of 
himself and his fellow-sufferers, and invited them to 
join and make a common invasion of Egypt. He 
undertook to conduct them into Auaris, the land of 
their forefathers, and to provide sustenance for the 
whole multitude of their people, and promised to 
fight for them if it should be needful, and speedily to 
give them possession of the country. The Shepherds 
accepted his proposal, and the whole nation joyfully 
set out on the expedition, being in number two hun- 
dred thousand men, and in a short time arrived at 
Auaris. Amenophis, the king of Egypt, when he 
heard of this invasion, was not a little alarmed, 
remembering the prediction of Amenophis, the son 
Papis." The historian then goes on to relate in 
detail, that the king fled with his army of Egyptians, 
taking with him Apis and the other sacred animals, 
into Ethiopia ; and that the Shepherds again gained 
possession of all Egypt without fighting a battle. 
They are said to have again behaved with the utmost 
cruelty towards the native people, burning their vil- 
lages, spoiling their temples, and roasting the sacred 
animals; for which impious purpose they kindled fires 
with the images of the gods, and even forced the priest* 



EXPELLED BY AMENOPHIS. *73 

and prophets to assist them in these abominable deeds. 
Manethon informs us that the priest who thus acted 
the part of a lawgiver and general was a Heliopo- 
litan, and was named Osarsiph, from Osiris, the god of 
Heliopolis ; but that when he had gone over to the 
Shepherds he changed his name, and was thencefor- 
ward called Moses. The history relates further, that, 
after the predicted period of suffering had elapsed, the 
king of Egypt returned with an army from Ethiopia, 
and having defeated the Shepherds, together with 
the Lepers, expelled them from the country, and 
pursued them to the confines of Syria. 

This second conquest of Egypt by the Shepherds 
is so completely, in all essential particulars, a copy of 
the first, that we may safely conclude the two 
relations to belong to the same event. The people 
were the same ; in both cases they came from the 
west ; in both relations they are said to have been 
the people of Jerusalem, and the nation who wor- 
shipped in the temple. In both instances their chief 
residence in Egypt was Auaris, which clearly appears 
to have been Goshen. On both occasions these 
foreigners are said to have overrun Egypt without a 
battle, and on both their success is imputed to the 
anger of the gods against the rulers and people 
of the country. On both occasions they were driven 
out of Egypt by an army from the south, and made 
their way through the wilderness to Palestine. In 
both these narratives circumstances are mentioned 
which cannot refer to any other event in history than 
the Exode of the Israelites. 

Besides these fragments of Manethon, we have 
several accounts from other Egyptian authors, of the 

I 



*%$ HISTORY OP THE JEWS 

Exode of the Israelites, which differ in some circum- 
stances from the above, though they agree in most of 
the main points. Some of them coincide nearly' 
with the first narrative of Manethon, others with the 
second. We shall make a brief abstract of them, 
before we proceed to the subject, on account of 
which especially we have entered into this detail. 

The most remarkable of these stories is from Cha> 
remon, who, though long subsequent to Manethon, 
was, like that annalist, a member of the hierarchy and 
an Egyptian sacred scribe. We are indebted to 
Joseph us for the preservation of it. 

Chaeremon, like Manethon, refers this story to the 
reign of a king of Egypt named Amenbphis. The 
following is a translation of the passage of this 
historian, preserved by Josephus. 

iC The goddess Isis appeared to Amenophis in his 
sleep, and reproached him that her temple lay in 
ruins, having been destroyed during the war." We 
are not informed to what war Cheeremon alludes, 
but it is probably the same devastation of Egypt 
which Manethon records in the incursion of the 
Shepherds. " The king, however," he continues, 
" was assured by Phritiphantes, the sacred scribe, that 
if he would purge the land of Egypt of all polluted 
persons, he should for the future be freed from such 
nightly terrors. The king hereupon caused the 
infected people, to the number of two hundred and 
fifty thousand persons, to be collected and driven out 
of the country. The leaders of this host were two 
scribes, named Moses and Joseph, the latter of whom 
was a sacred scribe : their Egyptian names were 
Tisithen and Peteseph. They proceeded to Pelusium, 



ACCORDING TO CHjEREMON AND LYSIMACHUS. *75 

and there found three hundred and eighty thousand 
people, who had been left by Anienophis, because 
that king was unwilling to introduce them into 
Egypt." These are evidently the Shepherds of Mane- 
thon, who dwelt in Auaris, or Goshen, apart from 
the Egyptians, and who are said, by that historian, 
to have given assistance to the expelled leprous 
people, under the guidance of Moses. cc Having 
entered into a league with these people, they invaded 
Egypt ; and Amenophis, without sustaining their at- 
tack, fled into Ethiopia, leaving his wife pregnant. 
She concealed herself in certain caverns, and there 
brought forth a son, whose name was Messenes ; and 
who, when he became adult, drove the Jews into 
Syria, in number about two hundred thousand men, 
and received back his father Amenophis, who 
returned from Ethiopia/' 

In this story as related by Chseremon, as well as in 
that of Manethon, we distinguish two classes of peo- 
ple, who are said to have formed the host of Moses ; 
first, the natives of Egypt, infected with leprosy ; and 
secondly, the Shepherds, inhabitants of Auaris, or 
Goshen, who are described by Manethon as a foreign 
people, from Judaea or Arabia. These Shepherds 
are evidently the genuine Israelites ; the native 
Egyptians, who accompanied the host of Israel, must 
have been a very inconsiderable number. 

A third story, of a similar kind, has been extracted 
by Joseph us from the works of Lysimachus, who 
referred it to the age of Bocchoris. In his reign the 
Jews, being infected with leprosy, itch, and other 
filthy diseases, took refuge in the temples, and be- 
came mendicants. Many people, at that time, beinjr 



*76 HISTORY OF THE JEWS 

infected with disease, a famine arose in the land of 
Egypt ; whereupon Bocchoris, the king, sent persons 
to consult the oracle of Jupiter Amnion. The god 
replied^ that the king must purge his temples of 
unholy and impious men, and drive them into desert 
places, and drown the lepers and diseased persons, 
the Sun heing indignant that such wretches were 
suffered to live ; that he must purify the temples, and 
that the earth would then bring forth its fruits." It is 
added, that the king obeyed, and caused the lepers to 
be drowned, and the impious or irreligious to be 
driven into the desert; who accordingly assembled, 
and having propitiated the gods, and kindling fires in 
the wilderness and keeping walch, put themselves 
under the command of one Moses, who undertook to 
conduct them into an inhabited country; and finally 
brought them to Judaea, where they built a city, 
which they called Jerusalem. 

Apollonius Molo was the author of another account 
of the Exode, which he has connected with circum- 
stances equally absurd and fabulous. He says that it 
happened in the age of Dido, and in the very year in 
which Carthage was built by the Phoenicians. The 
statement of this writer coincides, as it seems, in some 
particulars, with that of Lysimachus. 

Tacitus has given a brief summary of the various 
Stories prevalent in his time respecting the history of 
the Jews. Together with several fables he men- 
tions the true statement, that they were originally 
emigrants from Assyria, who had obtained possession 
of a part of Egypt, and afterwards removed to Pales- 
tine and the Hebrew countries; but he gives pre- 
ference to a relation in which he says most authors 



FROM MOLO AND TACITUS. *77 

agree, and which is almost a repetition of the story of 
Lysimachus. In the reign of Bocchoris a filthy disease 
broke out in Egypt, and the oracle of Amnion, being 
consulted on the occasion, commanded the king to 
purify the land by driving cut the Jews, a race of men 
who were hateful to the gods. The whole multitude 
of these people were accordingly collected and driven 
out into the wilderness, where they were reduced to 
the greatest extremities for want of water, until one 
of their number, named Moses, who had more cou- 
rage than the rest, happened, by following a troop of 
wild asses, to light on a plentiful spring of water. 
The crowd of exiles, being thus refreshed, performed 
their journey through the desert: and, arriving on the 
seventh day in Palestine, gained possession of the 
country, where they built the city and temple of Jeru- 
salem He adds, that the Jews always held the 
seventh day as sacred, because in seven days they 
had completed their perilous journey ; that they ab- 
stained from swine's flesh from the recollection of the 
calamities they had suffered on account of the disease 
to which that animal is subject; and that they con- 
tinued to w r orship the figure of an ass out of gratitude 
for their deliverance in the wilderness. This fable 
was very prevalent among the Greeks. The image 
of an ass, or of an ass's head, was supposed to be 
the great object of adoration in the temple of 
Jerusalem. 

The first of these stories recorded by Tacitus is 
evidently the same as Manethon's first invasion of the 
Shepherds. The second, which the author prefers 
because most writers agreed in it, coincides with the 
second invasion of Maneihon, and with that of 



*78 HISTORY OF THE JEWS 

Chaeremon. We may remark that Tacitus explicitly 
refers both these traditions to the Jewish nation. 

Photius,inhis Bibliotheca, has preserved a fragment 
of the thirty-fifth book of Diodorus Siculus, referring 
to the Exode of the Hebrews. He says that " in 
ancient times Egypt was afflicted with a great plague, 
which was attributed to the anger of God, on account 
of the multitude of foreigners in Egypt, by whom the 
rites of the native religion were neglected. The 
Egyptians accordingly drove them out. The most 
noble of them went under Cadmus and Danaus to 
Greece ; but the greater number followed Moses, a 
wise and valiant leader to Palestine. Moses con- 
quered the country, built Jerusalem, and instituted 
excellent laws and a pure religion." 

It is evident, from the great variations in time and 
circumstances, that none of these stories deserve any 
credit in opposition to the account the Jewish writers 
have given of the history of their nation. They all 
appear to have been inventions of a comparatively late 
period, founded on vague accounts, which remained 
in Egypt, of the departure of the Israelites; but they 
incidentally afford confirmation of most of the facts 
mentioned in Exodus. Manethon's history of Osar- 
siph is the least incongruous, although that relation 
contains, as Josephus has shown, many absurdities. 
This, however, appears certain, that very vague 
ideas prevailed of the era to which these events 
belonged ; for we see that some authors refer them 
to the reign of Amenophis, and others to that of 
Bocchoris. There were several kings named Ame- 
nophis, but the prince whom Manethon fixes 
upon lived, according to his own statement, about 



ACCORDING TO THE EGYPTIANS. *7$ 

sixty years before the Trojan war. Bocchoris 
immediately preceded Sabbaco, the Ethiopian, who 
was contemporary with Hosea, the last king of the 
ten tribes of Israel. 

As the ideas of these writers are so vague and con- 
tradictory, respecting the era of this last migration, 
we may conclude that they adopted uncertain tradi- 
tions, and referred them by conjecture to whatever 
time in the Egyptian history appeared to them 
most probable ; Manethon and Chaeremon, however, 
agree in the name of the king who pursued Moses 
towards the desert. It is therefore probable that 
Amenophis was his real name ; but I shall venture to 
suppose that Manethon committed an error in fixing 
on the Amenophis who stands in the third place of 
the nineteenth dynasty, instead of the third in the 
eighteenth. I found this opinion chiefly on two con- 
siderations. 

1. It seems manifest that the two relations given 
by Manethon of the conquest of Egypt by the 
Shepherds, refer to one and the same event. Now 
the retreat of the shepherds is indissolubly connected 
with the commencement of the eighteenth dynasty. 
We can therefore have nothing to do with a prince of 
the nineteenth. It was Tethmosis, the first king of 
the eighteenth dynasty, who besieged the shepherds 
in Auaris. But the first Amenophis is separated 
from Tethmosis, by an interval of only thirteen years. 
Transactions begun in the one reign may therefore 
have been completed in the other. On this ground I 
conclude that Amenophis the first was the king who 
pursued the Shepherds under Osarsiph. 

Secondly, without assuming that the first and 



*80 DATE OF THE EXODE. 

second relation belongs to the same event, from their 
coincidence of circumstances, let us consider the 
result of a comparison of dates. 

The Exode, or the departure of the Israelites from 
Egypt, has been differently dated by chronologers. 
According to that computation, which appears to be 
the best supported by the dates of scriptural history, 
five hundred and ninety-two years intervened be- 
tween this event and the era of the foundation of 
Solomon's Temple. This is the computation of 
Josephus. and it seems to have been adopted by St. 
Paul : it is preferred by Michaelis, and other learned 
writers among the moderns.* Let us now ascertain 
the era of the Exode, on these premises. 

We have dated the building of the 

Temple in the year 1027 B. C. 

Add for the interval above mentioned 592 



WefindthedateoftheExodein 1619 B.C. 

Reverting now to the chronicles of the Egyptians, 
we find the accession of the eighteenth dynasty dated 
as follows. 

The nineteenth dynasty obtained 
the sceptre of Egypt as before 

computed in the year 1350 

The collective reigns of the princes 
of the eighteenth dynasty amount 
to 328 1 1 mo. 



Therefore the accession of the 
eighteenth dynasty, falls in . . . c 1678 11 mo. 

* Refer to Note B. 



ACCORDING TO THE EGYPTIANS. *81 

and Tethmosis, the first king, began to reign about 
fifty years before the Exode. 

If we now proceed to a more minute examination, 
we shall find that Tethmosis must have been the 
king of Egypt who persecuted the Hebrews in the 
early years of Moses, and during whose reign the 
future lawgiver of Israel sought refuge in the deserts 
of Midian. His predecessor was the Pharaoh, sprung 
from a new dynasty, who knew not Joseph, and 
sought to diminish the numbers of the Israelites. 
This, at least, is the result of a comparison of dates. 
If we further deduct from the above sum of 1678 years 
and 1 1 months, 58 years and 1 1 months, which is the 
amount of the three first reigns, we shall find that 
the death of Amenophis the first falls in the year 
1620, B. C. which is within one year of the time when, 
according to the scriptural chronology, Pharaoh and 
his host were drowned in the Red Sea. This is a 
striking coincidence, and far more exact than we 
could reasonably expect. 

Such is the result of a careful analysis of the 
chronology of Manethon in this part of his work. 
We have some other historical testimonies which 
lead to a similar conclusion. The only circumstance 
that lessens the weight of their authority is, that we 
know not whence the writers we refer to derived 
their information : but, as many sources of knowledge 
were open to them which have been long since for 
ever closed, we are not entitled to reject the testi- 
monies of these chronologers, especially as they 
agree among themselves, and we have no ground on 
which we can rest an objection against them. 

1. Eusebius and Clemens Alexandria us have 

m . 



*82 



DATE OF THE EXODE. 



preserved a long passage from Artabanus, containing 1 
the history of the Jews in Egypt, and of their depar- 
ture under Moses, and mentioning the names of 
several persons, and many circumstances connected 
with the transactions of those times, of which we 
hear nothing from any other quarter.* According 
to Artabanus, the Egyptian king who treated Israel 
with cruelty was called Palmanothes. This seems 
to be another way of expressing in Greek letters the 
Egyptian name of Amenophes, or, as it may be 
written with the Coptic article, Ph'Amenophes. 

This Prince, according to Artabanus, built Kessan, 
or Goshen, and the temple of Heliopolis. His 
daughter was married to Chenephren,f king of a 
district in Upper Egypt ; C( for at that time/' as 
Artabanus says, Ci Egypt was divided into several 
petty kingdoms, over which, however, the king of 
Memphis seems to have held the chief sovereignty. 
The name of this princess was Merrhis : being child- 
less, she adopted a young Israelite, who was named 
Moyses, or Musaeus. The historian then relates that 
Moses was appointed to command an army against 
the . Ethiopians, and performed many celebrated 
exploits, which are of a very different description 
from those recorded in the Pentateuch. 

In Manethon's list of kings of the eighteenth dy- 
nasty, we have all these names somewhat differently 



* Euseb. Praep. Evang. lib. ix. cap. 2f. Clemens Alex. 
Strom, lib. i. 

X Chenephren is his name in Eusebius. Clemens calls 
him Nechephres, and the Alexandrine chronicle, which likewise 
copies Artabanus, gives his name Chenebron. 



ACCORDING TO THE EGYPTIANS. *83 

written ; Palmanothes, is Ph'Amenophes. Merrhis 
seems to be the queen Amersis, who reigned next to 
Amenophis : next to Amersis, Josephus had set down 
the name of Mephris; but Eusebius regarded this as 
the same with Amersis. Now Mephris, Mersis, or 
Merrhis, are very slight variations, in the attempt to 
represent in greek letters an Egyptian female name ; 
the aspirate consonants being continually inter- 
changed. Chenebron, or Chenephren, is perhaps the 
same king who occurs in Manethon's list, under the 
name of Chebron, immediately before Amenophis. 

These coincidences afford some additional reason 
to believe that the Amenophes who pursued Moses 
was the third king of the eighteenth dynasty. 

2. All the old chronolo^ers refer the Exode of the 
Israelites to the same epoch., viz. the commencement 
of the reign of the eighteenth dynasty. They speak, 
indeed, of these transactions as if the calamities of the 
Hebrews had commenced and terminated under 
Tethmosis, or Amosis; but the reign of this king is 
too short for the whole series of events. If Tethmosis 
was the monarch in whose time Moses was driven 
from Egypt, or obliged to take refuge in Arabia, the 
reign of Amenophis will fall in with the Exode. 
Probably Tethmosis carried on war against the 
Israelites, and subdued them, as Manethon relates. 
For it cannot be supposed that a nation of such 
power and multitude would submit, without some 
attempt at resistance, to the most dreadful slavery. 
Many of them probably took flight, and the remainder 
were sent, as Manethon says, to labour in the quarries 
on the Eastern frontier. Afterwards, on the return 
of Moses from the land of Midian, these same 



*84 DATE OF THE EXODE. 

Hebrew, or Arabian shepherds, now reduced to a 
state of slavery, became the occasion of numerous 
calamities to Egypt and the house of Pharaoh, as 
related in the book of Exodus. Hence the double 
narrative contained in the works of Manethon. Teth- 
mosis was the king who conquered the shepherds. 
He seems to have been the Pharaoh who reduced the 
number and power of the Israelites, and from whom 
Moses fled. If this was the case, and the table of 
Manethon is correct, Amenophis the first must have 
been the Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red Sea. 

Eusebius has given us a long extract from the chro- 
nography of Julius African us, in which that learned 
writer has cited several authorities, tending to prove 
that Moses was contemporary with Amosis, or Teth- 
mosis.* The following are the authors whose testimony 
he has adduced. 

Apion the grammarian, surnamed Pleistonices, who 
was a native Egyptian, asserted in the fourth 
book of his history, and in his book against the 
Jews, that the Egyptian king Amosis took and des- 
troyed Avaris, or Athyria, in the time of Inachus, 
king of Argos, and that in his reign Moses and the 
Hebrews were driven out of Egypt. Theophilus 
of Antioch, the chronologer, agreed in the same 
computation. 

Ptolemy, the priest of Mendes, was quoted by 
Apion in proof of this statement. Ptolemy wrote a 
history of the exploits of the Egyptian kings, in three 
books. In the third of these he recited the events 
that happened in the reign of Amosis, and mentioned 
the Exode. 

* Euseb. Praep. Ev, lib. x. cap. 11. 



ACCORDING TO THE EGYPTIANS. *85 

Africanus, in the passage above alluded to, cites 
also Polemo, who, in his first hook on the Grecian 
history, related that in the time of Apis, king of 
Argos, son of Phoroneus, a part of the military popula- 
lation of Egypt emigrated from that country, and 
settled in the Syrian Palestine, not far from Arabia. 
(c He refers/' says Eusebius, to those who were led 
by Moses." Herodotus also calls the Jews, Syrians 
of Palestine, and says, that they were emigrants from 
Egypt. The age of Inachus and Phoroneus was cal- 
culated by Tatian and Eusebius to have been about 
sixteen reigns, or rather more than 400 years before 
the Trojan war.* Inachus was considered by all 
these writers as contemporary with Tethmosis. 

From all these authorities and concurring circum- 
stances it seems to be ascertained, as far as we can 
expect any question referring to so remote a period, 
and in so obscure a history, to be decided, that the 
Shepherds, who were expelled from Egypt by the first 
princes of the eighteenth dynasty, were the Israelites, 
who were led by Moses into Canaan. Manethon, 
who related their history so circumstantially, certainly 
considered the Shepherds as identical with the 

* These reigns are termed generations, but many of them 
were in fact collateral successions. They are thus enumerated 
by Tatian. 

1. Inachus 6. Critopus 13. Perseus 

2. Phoroneus 7. Sthenelaus 14. Eurysthcufi 
5. Apis 8. Danaus 15. Atreus 

4. Argius 9. Lynceus 16. Thyestes 

5. Criasus 10. Abas. 17. Agamemnon 

6. Phorbas 11. Praotus 
p. Triopus 12. Acrisius 



*86 DATE OF THE EXODE. 

Hebrews; for he mentions that they retired from 
Egypt by treaty, and built Jerusalem and the temple : 
and although in the subsequent part of his history he 
adopted the popular story, which represented the Jews 
as decended in part from Egyptian outcasts ; yet he 
considered the history of these as so interwoven with 
that of the Shepherds, that he found himself driven to 
the expedient of bringing that people again from 
Jerusalem to Goshen, and relating over again their 
invasion of Egypt, and their subsequent expulsion 
from it, with almost the same circumstances which 
occurred in the first narrative of their descent from 
Arabia or Palestine. Chseremon also, and Apollo- 
nius Molo, and Lysimachus, from some of whom 
Diodorus and Tacitus drew their information, by 
combining the circumstances of these two relations, 
and referring them both to the history of the Jews, 
seem to leave no room for further doubt, that the 
Shepherds who built Jerusalem were, contrary to the 
opinion of modern chronologers, the same people 
who were led through the wilderness by Moses. 



OF THE EARLY DYNASTIES. *87 



SECTION VI. 

Of the first Seventeen Dynasties in the Chronicle of Manethon. 

We now proceed to the chronology of the earlier 
dynasties in the chronicle of Manethon. We shall 
consider it as proved, by the foregoing observations, 
that the commencement of the eighteenth dynasty, 
with the reigns of Tethmosis and Amenophis, was 
coeval with the history of Moses and the Exode of 
the Israelites from Egypt. 

Thus far the chronology of Manethon coincides 
almost exactly with that of the Hebrew historians. 
In the ages which precede we have no opportunity of 
comparing them, as we here derive no information from 
the scriptures respecting the affairs of Egypt. It must, 
however, be allowed that so far as we have yet followed 
him, Manethon has approved himself a tolerably faith- 
ful guide. In tracing his history of Egypt up to the 
fifteenth century before the Christian era, we have 
discovered no symptom of a design to extend beyond 
just limits the antiquity of his native country. He, 
therefore, deserves more consideration than he has 
commonly obtained, when we come to examine those 
parts of his narrative which lie beyond the reach of 
a comparison with the history of other nations. 

If we allow that Amenophis was the Pharaoh 



*88 DATE OP THE OCCUPATION OP 

who perished in the pursuit of Israel, and fix the 
end of his reign in the year before Christ 1 61 9, and 
cast up in one direct line the reigns of the first kings 
of the eighteenth dynasty, and the whole sum of the 
collective reigns of the preceding seventeen dynasties, 
up to Menes the first king, we shall date the com- 
mencement of the Egyptian monarchy at a very 
remote period. 

We shall observe how far this method of com- 
puting will lead us. 

The fragment of Manethon's chronicle, preserved 
by Josephus, is so much more perfect, as far as it ex- 
tends, than either of the abstracts copied by Syncellus, 
that we shall regard it as containing the genuine 
numbers of Manethon, and shall not take the trouble 
to compare the dates of Eusebius and Africanus. 

The three first kings of the eighteenth dynasty, 
including Amenophis, reigned fifty- eight years and 
eleven months, which we shall call 59 years. 

The whole time that elapsed from the invasion of 
the Shepherds, until they abandoned Egypt, is stated 
by Manethon, according to the extract preserved by 
Josephus, to have been 511 years. From this 
number we must subtract the above sum of 59 years, 
and add the remainder to 1619, the date of theExode, 
and we shall obtain the sum of 2071 years before 
Christ, for the date of the era when the Shepherds 
made their first entry into Egypt. 

Manethon observes that there were several dynasties 
of Shepherds, and Africanus mentions three, viz. the 
fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth dynasties, as 
consisting of Shepherd kings. The beginning of the 
fifteenth dynasty is, therefore, the commencement of 



EGYPT BY THE SHEPHERDS. *89 

the reign of the shepherds, and is to be dated at 
2071 years before Christ. 

The whole sum obtained by adding the collective 
reigns of the first fourteen dynasties, is, according to 
Africanus, two thousand seven hundred and twenty- 
one, and according* to Eusebius, two thousand nine 
hundred and seventy-two.* If we add these sums to 
the date before obtained, viz. two thousand and 
seventy-one, we shall find the commencement of the 
Egyptian monarchy to fall four thousand seven 
Tiundredand ninety-two years before Christ, according 
to the former, and five thousand and forty-three 
according to the latter. This is on the supposition 
that all these dynasties succeeded each other in a 
direct line. 

Various attempts have been made to reconcile the 
chronology of Manethon with that of Moses. Peri- 
zonius allows the Egyptian annalist to be correct, 
through the later half of the chronicle ; but not 
knowing what to do with the first fifteen dynasties, 
he boldly erases them at once, and declares them to 
be a forgery of the author. + This way of proceeding 
is more like cutting the Gordian knot than untying it. 
We have no right to act in so summary a manner. 
If we cannot reconcile the antiquity assumed by the 
annals of one nation with the dates assigned for the 

* We must here remark that the fourteenth dynasty is 
wanting in the series of Africanus, and the fifth in that of 
Eusebius. In order to make up the sums total, we have 
supplied the chasm in each, by taking the term of years 
assigned to the defective dynasty in the other list. 

f Perizonius has been followed by several later authors, 
particularly by Dr. Hales. 

n 



*90 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

origin of empires and of the world in the records of 
the other, we have no other course to pursue than to 
acknowledge the contradiction between them. We 
may have good reasons for placing confidence in one 
record rather than the other, but we have no right to 
cut off from the archives of Egypt all that extends too 
far, as if we were shortening the limbs of Procrustes., 
and then pretend that we have reconciled them with 
the computation of the Hebrew scriptures. 

But, though we ought to abstain from new model- 
ling the Egyptian antiquities, after the pattern of the 
Hebrew, no objection can be made to our com- 
paring all the documents we possess that relate to 
the chronology of Egypt, and endeavouring to find 
some method of reconciling them with themselves. 
We are only bound, while proceeding in this attempt, 
to exclnde all prejudice in favour of those particular 
methods that lead to conclusions which we are from 
other considerations inclined to adopt. 

The three principal documents on which we must 
depend for information, respecting the antiquity of the 
Egyptian monarchy, are the table of Manethon now 
under consideration, the list of thirty dynasties 
entitled by Syncellus the Old Chronicle, which 
seems to have been extracted from ancient historical 
works included in the number of the Hermaic books, 
and the series of Theban kings by Eratosthenes. 
These relics bear a near relation to each other ; they 
are all professedly derived from the same or correla- 
tive sources, viz. the sacred records kept in the 
Egyptian temples. Manethon is believed by Syn- 
cellus, to have formed his work on the model of the 
Old Chronicle, as a kind of supplement to it, or 



©F THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *91 

exposition of it : his plan, at least, or outline, is the 
same ; and that Eratosthenes obtained his materials 
from documents not entirely unconnected with these 
is evident, from the names and reigns of the two 
first kings, Menes and Athothes, which are the same 
in his list as in that of Manethon. As these docu- 
ments are thus connected, it is to them that we must 
look for their mutual illustration. The tables taken 
from Herodotus and Diodorus, in the early part of the 
Egyptian history, contain only a few names, with 
chasms of prodigious extent between them, and are, 
for reasons before assigned, less worthy of regard in 
this instance than those which have been preserved by 
professed chronologers. Let us now observe what are 
the dates assigned for the commencement of the first 
dynasty, that is, for the accession of Menes, by the 
Old Chronicle. 

The dates of the first seventeen dynasties, according 
to the Old Chronicle, are as follows : 

Years. 

The 17th dynasty reigned 103 

The 16th dynasty reigned 190 

The fifteen generations of the Cynic circle, 
which correspond with the first fifteen 
dynasties of Manethon, reigned 443 

Total, 736 

Now the accession of the eighteenth dynasty took 
place, as we have shown, fifty-nine years before the 
Exode. 59 + 736 = 795, added to 1619, the date of 
the Exode, will give us 2414 B. C. as the beginning 
of the reign of Menes, and of the first dynasty. 



*92 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

This date we are inclined to look upon as near the 
true era of the commencement of the monarchy. 

It must be allowed that the series of Theban kings, 
according to Eratosthenes, as the years were computed 
by Syncellus, assigns a period more remote, by about 
two hundred and fifty years, for the reign of Menes. 
This difference may be diminished on the supposition 
made long ago by Goar, the learned editor of Syn- 
cellus, that the one hundred and seventy-eight years, 
which are wanting in the numbers of the Old Chro- 
nicle, in order to fill up the sum total, and which have 
been dropped through the carelessness of some 
copyist, belonged to the reign of the Cynic circle. 
If we add this number to the period above men- 
tioned, the date of the reign of Menes in the Old 
Chronicle and the Register of Eratosthenes, will 
differ only sixty-nine years. But on this subject we 
shall find hereafter more satisfactory evidence. Our 
present business is to inquire how the chronology 
of Manethon can be made to agree with either of 
these documents. 

The only method of reducing it, so as to bring out 
any degree of correspondence with the shorter com- 
putation, is on the supposition that the dynasties 
were not all successive in one direct line, but that 
some of them were contemporary. But we have no 
right to assume this point without proof. 

We may, however, observe that the native 
dynasties of Egyptian kings seem to have continued 
to reign while Egypt was under the yoke or sub- 
jected to the influence and the inroads of the 
Shepherds. 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *93 

This appears evident from the narrative of Mafie- 
thon ; for that historian informs us that after Egypt 
had suffered dreadfully from the cruelties of the 
Shepherds, the kings of the Thebaid and of other 
parts of Egypt revolted against them, and under the 
command of Tethmosis subdued them. Here we 
find that the native kings had continued to rule, if not 
in Memphis, at least in the more distant provinces of 
Egypt, during the reign of the Shepherds.* 

Other circumstances in the history lead us to the 
same inference. The be^innin^ of the rei<ni of the 
Shepherds is dated by Manethon at 511 years before 
their final expulsion and departure for Judaea, that 
is, at 511 years before the Exode. Now if this 
computation be only correct in a tolerable degree, 
the history of Abraham's journey to Egypt, as 
well as that of Joseph, will fall within the period of 
the Shepherds' tyranny. f From the account which 
we have in Genesis, of the journey of Abraham into 
Egypt, it is evident that the country was then in a 
state that subjected it to nomadic incursions, other- 
wise the patriarch could not have passed through it 
with his horde, like a tribe of Arabs, to the court of 

* The Shepherds are represented as having oppressed the 
country, and reduced the people to great extremites ; but it 
appears that they did not destroy the native governments. 
Their chief residence was not at Diospolis, then the capital, but 
at iUiaris or Goshen, where they employed themselves, as we 
are told, in collecting the revenues of the land, and distributing 
corn; an allusion to the history of Joseph. 

t This must be allowed from considering the dates merely, 
though it should not be agreed that the departure of the 
Shepherds was the same event as the Exode of the Israelites, 



*94 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

Pharaoh. Many facts indicate that some great 
movement was going on about that time among the 
nations of the Syrian or Assyrian family ; that they 
were now quitting their abode, perhaps further in 
the East, and pouring into the West. The earliest 
of these incursions must, if we believe the chronology 
of Manethon, already have opened Egypt, before 
Abraham's time, to the inroads of nomadic people, 
It was probably at this period that the Semitic tribes 
occupied all the countries to the eastward of Egypt. 

Nor do these suppositions contradict the contents 
of the last section, in which I have endeavoured to 
prove that .the Shepherds, said to have been over- 
thrown by Tethmosis and Amenophis, were in reality 
the people that followed Moses towards Palestine. 
Manethon assures us that several dynasties or fami- 
lies of shepherds held Egypt under their sway or 
influence. The Hebrews were one of them, and 
their history was so remarkable, and the events that 
brought about their deliverance so calamitous to 
Egypt, that it is no wonder that we find their depar- 
ture recorded as so signal an event. Probably the 
descendants of the earlier nomades, were dispersed 
over Abyssinia. We may thus account for the 
wide diffusion of the Geez and Amharic languages, 
which are of the Syrian, Arabic, or Hebraic stock. 
Thus also we may explain the near resemblance of 
the Abyssins to the Israelites, an affinity greater than 
we can account for by the relationship of both to the 
Arabs. That inroads were made at this epoch into 
Ethiopia we learn from Josephus, who gives an 
account of an army dispatched by the king of Egypt 
against Merbe. 



Of THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *95 

These ideas, however, I throw out as matter of 
conjecture. All that I insist upon is, that the inroads 
or domination of the shepherds must have commenced 
before the time of Joseph ; since, whatever method 
we adopt of arranging the series of dynasties, the age 
of this patriarch must fall between the beginning 
and termination of the five hundred and eleven years. 
Now it is evident, from the history of Joseph, that at 
the time when he held an office, similar to that of a 
Grand Vizier, in the court of Egypt, a native race of 
Pharaohs sat upon the throne, and the ancient cus- 
toms and indigenous polity were maintained in the 
country. Shepherds, that is, killers of sheep, those 
who slaughtered the representatives or the kindred 
of their god Ammon, were an abomination to the 
Egyptians. We may infer that at this time, which is 
within the long period assigned to the sway of the 
nomadic kings, the native line of princes continued 
to reign, at least over that part of Egypt where 
Joseph resided. 

Since it appears, both from the history of this 
period, as it is given by Manethon, and from the 
facts recorded in Genesis, that the native princes of 
Egypt continued to reign during the domination of 
the shepherds, we are at liberty to suppose that the 
dynasties of Memphite and Diospolite kings, which 
are mentioned in the list of Manethon, before and 
after the shepherd dynasties, were intended to form a 
continued succession, reaching down through that 
period of five hundred and eleven years, during which 
the shepherds ruled. This enables us to deduct these 
five hundred and eleven years from the long chrono- 
logy of Manethon., or to leave it out of our reckoning ; 



*95 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

and thus we make one step towards reducing the 
dates of that historian to an agreement with those of 
the Old Chronicle and Eratosthenes. 

But, after this reduction, the period that yet remains 
for the earliest dynasties is by far too great. It exceeds 
the computation of the Old Chronicle and Eratos- 
thenes, by many centuries. 

The expedient of which modern chronologers have 
generally availed themselves, in order to reconcile 
the chronicle of Manethon with the shorter periods 
allowed by other historians, is the scheme proposed 
by Sir John Marsham, who conjectured that Egypt, 
in the earliest ages, was divided into several distinct 
kingdoms, and that the Chronicle contains several 
different successions of kings ; that the dynasties of 
Diospolites, for example, gives a series of princes who 
ruled over the Thebaid, and were coeval with the 
other dynasties of Memphites, Elephantinites, and 
Thinites. In this way of understanding it, this 
chronicle may be reduced so as to quadrate even 
with a lower computation of antiquity than that of 
Eratosthenes. 

But the hypothesis that Egypt was ever divided 
into several independent kingdoms is entirely a 
gratuitous conjecture, and is contradicted by the 
whole tenour of Egyptian history. The kings of 
Egypt are frequently mentioned in the scriptural 
history under the title of Pharaoh ; but we never find 
that there was more than one Pharaoh at a time. If 
such had been the condition of the countrv, some 
trace of it could scarcely fail to be shown in the 
Hebrew histories, considering how intimately con- 
nected the affairs of the Israelites were on several 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *97 

occasions with those of the Egyptians. Neither can 
any fact be produced from the writings of Greek 
authors, who treat of Egypt, that favours such an 
opinion. Homer mentions a king of Egypt who 
reigned at Diospolis ; yet his dominion extended 
down to the sea-coast. Herodotus and Diodorus 
give testimony directly against the conjecture of 
Marsh am. 

It will however be found, unless I am much mis- 
taken, on an attentive scrutiny of these tables, that 
although there is no historical ground for Marsham's 
conjecture respecting the division of Egypt into 
independent monarchies, yet there are facts con- 
nected with the construction of the Chronicle which 
lead to nearly similar conclusions,^ as far as the 
chronological system is concerned. 

I shall now mention my own opinion on this 
subject, and the internal evidence on which it is 
founded. I was led to it, not by the conjecture of 
any chronologer, but by some circumstances which 
attracted my attention in the Chronicle itself. 

Manethon and Eratosthenes derived their informa- 
tion from the sacred registers deposited in the Egyptian 
temples. It would seem that records were kepi in 
the temples in several different nomes or provinces of 
that kingdom : some at Memphis, some at Diospolis, 
and others elsewhere. Of these it appears that the 
historians availed themselves. Here is an obvious 
source of discrepancy in documents compiled by writers 
whose materials were drawn from different quarters. 
Manv causes miorht snve rise to differences in the 
registers, for example, kept at Memphis, and at Dios- 
polis, or Elephantine. The former of these cities was 

o 



*98 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

taken possession of by the Shepherds, and remained 
some time subject to their yoke; the latter was occa- 
sionally under the sway of the Ethiopians. Hence 
real and considerable variations might arise in the 
succession of kings at such distant places. Occasion- 
ally it might happen, as it occurs sometimes in all 
eastern countries, that prefects and provincial gover- 
nors would revolt and assume independent sway, 
and maintain for a time their authority. Nothing is 
more probable than that such petty rulers would 
inscribe their own names on the records of the mo- 
narchy, in the place of their superiors. The lists of 
nomarchs might become confounded with those of the 
kings. Even in the names of the kings themselves 
variations would not fail occasionally to happen, owing 
to the imperfection of alphabetic writing and ortho- 
graphy in very remote periods, to the difference of 
dialects in distant provinces, the multiplicity of names 
given to the sovereigns, and still more to the substitu- 
tion of magnificent titles and epithets in the place of 
proper appellatives ; a practice to which the adula- 
tion of the oriental people frequently gives occasion. 
Circumstances of this nature, and others which need 
not be enumerated, must be supposed to have produced 
great diversity in the chronological registers kept 
during the same period in different districts; so that 
although Memphis and Diospolis were in general sub- 
ject to the monarch of all Egypt, yet the series of 
kings, as exhibited in the registers at Thebes, might 
differ materially from that of the Memphite records. 

Manethon seems, as Syncellus has remarked, to have 
had before him the Old Chronicle when he undertook 
the compilation of his table, and to have adjusted his 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *99 

plan according to that model. This chronicle pro- 
fessedly contains thirty dynasties; but the first half of 
this number consists of fifteen generations of the 
Cynic Circle. Manethon seems to have considered 
this, as modern chronologers have done, as a sort of 
chasm or imperfection in the series; and, with a view 
of supplying the deficiency, he filled up the first fif- 
teen places with dynasties under similar titles to those 
which are comprised in the remainder of the table, and 
which nearly correspond as in the Old Chronicle and 
in his own. In order to obtain materials to supply 
these fifteen lists, he collected the old records from 
different Egyptian nomes, and formed dynasties of 
Memphite kings from the registers of Memphis, and 
of Diospolitan from the sacred records of Thebes. In 
general, it is to be presumed that he procured the 
oldest documents, and that the earliest dynasties con- 
sist, for the most part, of tables of kings who reigned 
in Egypt before the invasion of the Shepherds ; but 
there are, as we shall find, exceptions to this remark. 

That the first fifteen dynasties were constructed in 
this manner may be proved, as it appears to me, from 
internal evidence. 

The Thinite dynasties, for example, present some 
singular coincidences with those of Elephantine. The 
Thinite kings begin with Menes. They reigned in 
Upper Egypt, for there was the seat of government 
in the earliest times. The series of princes of Elephan- 
tine is therefore likely to coincide nearly with the 
Thinites, as the registers were kept at no great dis- 
tance, and few diversities could arise in the order of 
sovereign rulers. Now, of the nine Elephantinite kings, 
the five first names correspond so nearly with the last 
of the Thinites, that if some allowance is made for 



*100 



DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 



such mistakes in orthography as may have happened 
in representing- Egyptian or Coptic names in Greek 
letters, it will appear that both these tables refer to 
the same succession. 



Thinite Kings. 


Elephantinite Kings, 


Chaeres 


*Ouser-Cheres 


* * ' * 


Sephres 


Nephercheres 


Nephercheres 


Sesochris 


Sisiris 


Cheneres 


Cheres. 



But a more distinct example of this repetition is 
afforded by the comparison of the twelfth dynasty 
of Diospolites, which holds its place in the former 
part of the Chronicle, with the nineteenth dynasty, 
who are also termed Diospolites, in the latter part. 
The coincidence in this case consists not merely in 
names, but is borne out by a repetition of historical 
facts, 

XII. Dynasty. XVIII. and XIX. Dynasties. 

2d king, Ammenemes Amenophis 

3d Sesostris Sethosis 

4th Laehares Rhapses 

5th Ammeres Ammenephthes, or Amenophis 

6th Ammenemes Ammenemmes 

The comparison of names alone would be sufficient 
to excite a suspicion, but we are not left in this state 
of uncertainty. For, in the fragment of Manethon 
preserved by Josephus, we have an account of the 
exploits of Sethosis, which, compared with the history 
of Sesostris given by Herodotus and Diodorus, and 

* Ouser is an Egyptian title prefixed to various proper 
names, as Osarsiph. 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *1Q1 

the brief notices of Africanus and Eusebius, leave no 
doubt that they were the same person. Sethosis was 
the conqueror who marched through the East, and 
who, on his return to Egypt, suffered from the trea- 
chery of his brother. In short, iu every circumstance 
his story agrees with that of Sesostris;* and several 
considerations unite in proving that the nineteenth 
dynasty was the true place in chronology for this 
celebrated warrior. Yet, on turning back to the 
twelfth dynasty, we find the name of Sesostris, in 
somewhat suspicious company, as we have above 
remarked, and not only the name, but. the exploits of 
Sesostris connected with it, as if they were set down 
for the express purpose of convicting Manethon of 
inaccuracy in his compilation. It is here evident that 
the historian, in order to fill up his twelfth dynasty, 
has extracted from some record containing another 
copy of the same piece of chronology, which had 
served for the foundation of the later series, where 
the history of Sesostris occurs in its proper place. 

We shall subject our hypothesis to one further 
test, which may perhaps afford a proof that will be 
satisfactory to most of our readers. In the earliest 
part of Manethon's chronicle, the 3d, 4th, and 6th 
dynasties consist of Memphite kings. Fortunately 
these three dynasties have been preserved in a 
more complete state than most other parts of the 
Chronicle. They seem, from their place in the 
series, to have been copied from the oldest records of 
Memphis. They are the first Memphite dynasties 
mentioned in the Chronicle, and may be supposed 
to contain a table of the kings who reigned in that 

* It is allowed by all that Sethos, or Sethosis, was Sesostris, 



*102 DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 

city from its foundation. These dynasties afford us 
an unbroken series of twenty-three kings. Let us 
suppose that it commences from the foundation of 
monarchy in Egypt. On that hypothesis we may 
expect to trace some relation between it and the 
table of Eratosthenes, which we imagine to contain a 
coeval series, and perhaps a record of the same 
succession ; one list having been copied from the 
registers in the temples of Memphis, and the other 
from those in Diospolis. 

Now, it happens that the last of these twenty- 
three monarchs of Memphis is a queen, and there 
are only two other queens in the whole thirty dy- 
nasties. Her name is Nitocris. It is remarkable 
also that the twenty-second monarch in the Theban 
list of Eratosthenes is a queen named Nitocris. He- 
rodotus also mentions Nitocris as a celebrated queen ; 
and, from the manner in which he speaks of her, it is 
plain that he had heard of but one Egyptian sovereign 
of that name. We may take it as nearly certain, that 
the Nitocris who stands in the twenty-third place in 
the series of Memphite princes, is the same person 
who occurs in the twenty-second, among the sove- 
reigns of Thebes. What still further supports our 
conjecture is the coincidence in time ; for the twenty- 
two Memphite princes preceding Nitocris reigned, 
according to Manethon, in all, 691 years; and, by 
adding up the Theban reigns that precede the same 
name in the laterculus of Eratosthenes, we obtain 687, 
which is within four years of the same period. 

We shall now set down the twenty-three names of 
Memphite sovereigns opposite to the twenty-two of 
Thebans, and observe what relations the two lists 
present 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *103 

Theban List of Eratosthenes. First Memphite Dynasties of 

Manet hon. 

Menes, or Mines Thebinitus Necherophis 

Athothes Tosorthros or iEscu - 

lapius 
Yeais. r 

Athothes 2 ^w^^-^ T y ris 

IHabies 19 17 ... . Mesochris 

Semphos, or Som-Phos ..18 16 Soiphis 

Toigar 791 f.. . TASER-tasis 19 

St-Oichos 63 \. . . Achis 42 

Gosormies 30 SO Siphouris 

Mares 26 26 Ker-pheres 

Anoyphes 20 

SIRIOS, or SIROES .... 18 29 ... . SORIS 

Chnoubos Gneuros . .27^ ^ _, 

? . I „ f... Rhat-oises 

Rau-osis 13 > 50 47-} „. , 

^. t*.. • , ~J /••• Bi-cheres 

Bi-uris, or Biyns . . 10^ 

SAOPHIS 29 63 . . . . SOUPHIS 

SAOPHISthe2d 37 66 .... SOUPHIS the 2d 

Mos-CHERIS 21 63 ... . Men-CHERES 

* Rhatoises 25 

Bicheres 22 

* S ... . Seber-cheres 

\ 9 Thamphthis 

Mousthis 33 1 68 \ -....Othoes 

Pamm0S •••• 35 -> ) 53....Phios 

7 . . . . Methousouphis 

Apappos 100 100 Phi-ops 

Achescus Ocaras 1 1 Mentesouphis 

Nitocris 6 12 ....Nitocris 

687 691 

* Rhatoises and Bicheres stand next to Menchercs, in the table 
of Eratosthenes. 



*104 



DATE OF THE COMMENCEMENT 



It must be confessed that there are many names 
standing opposite to each other, in these two tables, 
which have no resemblance. In these instances we 
suppose that the names of nomarchs or provincial 
governors have been inserted in the list instead of the 
sovereigns of Egypt, or that temporary dismember- 
ments of the monarchy had taken place. Sometimes, 
however, though the names differ, the periods of the 
reigns exactly coincide. Here we may presume that 
the multiplicity of titles or epithets assumed by eastern 
sovereigns, and frequently adopted, as we well know, 
by the kings of Egypts, have given rise to the diver- 
sity. All this, it is true, is a mere hypothesis : but 
we assume nothing more than what the circum- 
stances of the case, on the supposition maintained, 
must have given rise to. We rest the whole weight 
of proof in the present instance on the coincidences 
between the two successions above collated, which 
we shall now more distinctly point out. 

1. The reign of Nitocris is set down differently in 
the two tables. She probably reigned longer at 
Thebes than in Lower Egypt. She was an Ethio- 
pian, and Thebes was nearer to her native country 
than Memphis. She might be enabled to maintain 
her government at Thebes after the cruelties which 
are ascribed to her had caused her expulsion from 
Lower Egypt. 

If the Theban Nitocris were not the same person 
as the Memphite, it would be unaccountable that the 
two reigns preceding her name should have precisely 
the same duration in both successions, especially as 
the terms of each are very singular ones. The reign 
immediately preceding Nitocris is only one year, and 



OF THE EGYPTIAN MONARCHY. *105 

the reign before that is in both the tables 100 years. 
There is only one king in the whole chronicle of 
Manethon who reigned 100 years, and only one in the 
laterculus of Eratosthenes, and in each it is assigned 
to the last predecessor but one of Nitocris. The 
chances against such a coincidence, as a matter 
of accident, are more than a thousand to one ; 
and we have a proof, strong in the same proportion, 
that this name in both the records designates the 
same person. 

The names given to the king who reigned 100 
years are not very unlike ; nor does it require much 
etymological torturing to show that they may have 
sprung from the same Egyptian original. Apappos 
has a Greek termination, and has evidently under- 
gone some modification. It seems, as Jablonski 
observed without entertaining the least idea of 
this comparison, to be the same word which the 
Greek mycologists wrote Epaphus, the old Argive 
title of the bull Apis, The Coptic or Egyptian 
articles are sometimes placed, as every one knows, at 
the beginnings, sometimes at the endings, of words ; 
and this variation constitutes all the difference be- 
tween Apa-phi or Epa-phi, which by a Greek writer 
would be expressed Epaphos or Apappos, and 
Phi-Apa, whence the Memphite name Phiops. 

In the two preceding names in the Theban list I 
see no resemblance to the three Memphite names 
which stand opposite to them, unless Mousthis may 
be a contraction of Methousouphis. If this be the 
fact, two of the Memphite names must have been 
accidentally transposed. 

I am, however, strongly inclined to suspect that 

P 



*!GS ANTIQUITY OF THESES AND MEMPHIS. , 

the preceding names, Rhatoises and Bicheres, have 
been copied by accident out of their proper place, 
and that they originally stood before Souphis. Of this 
hereafter. 

2. The name preceding Mousthis, viz. Moscheres, 
is interpreted by Eratosthenes Heliodotus, "the 
gift of the Sun." This is the interpretation also of 
Mencheres. Both these terms were apparently titles 
or epithets ; and, as they have the same signification, 
probably belonged to the same king. 

3. Souphis the first and Souphis the second are 
evidently the same as Saophis the first and Saophis 
the second. 

We have here three successive names in the list of 
Manethon, which are nearly identical with the three 
names opposite to them in the Theban series, viz. 
Souphis I, Souphis 2, and Men-cheres, corresponding 
with Souphis 1, Souphis 2, and Mos-cheris. How 
many chances would there be against such a coinci- 
dence as this, arising merely from accident? 

It is true that the lengths assigned to these reigns 
do not agree; but 192 years is so improbable a 
duration for three following reigns in an hereditary 
succession, that we have reason to suspect an error in 
some of these dates. 

4. The two Theban names preceding Saophis, 
viz. Rau-osis, and Bi'yris or Bi-hyris, bear a strong 
resemblance to Rhatoises and Bicheres in the 
Memphite list; and I suspect that these names 
originally stood as I have set them down in italics, 
and that a careless copyist accidentally transposed 
them. No error is more likely to occur than one 
of this description. 



manethon's tables explained. *107 

5. Sirios, or Siroes, corresponds with Soris. 

6. Thus far we trace a resemblance or identity in 
the names themselves. The two preceding kings in 
the Memphite series, viz. Siphouris, and Kerpheres, 
exhibit no resemblance whatever in this respect to 
those placed opposite to them, but it is remarkable 
that both the reigns in one table are exactly of the 
same duration as the reigns which stand opposite 
to Ihem in the other. It is probable, therefore, that 
either Manethon or Eratosthenes has set down 
epithets or titles instead of proper names. 

7. St-Oichos seems to be the same name as Achis. 
St, or Sta, is a common prefix. It occurs conjoined 
to several names which we know to be complete 
appellatives without it. Thus we have below 
St-Amenemes : Amenemes being a very common 
name in the catalogue of Egyptian kings. 

6. Taigar statids opposite to Taser-tasis. Taigar 
seems to be only a variation in the orthography of 
Taser. The Egyptian letter corresponding with the 
Coptic J, or soft G, has no exact correlative in the 
Greek alphabet, and is represented indifferently by 
Sigma, or by Gamma.. 

7. Semphos stands before Taigar, and opposite to 
the Memphite Soiphis. The son of Hercules is the 
Greek interpretation of this name, and it was ori- 
ginally Somphos. A slight error, occasioning the 
omission of a consonant, may have given rise to the 
difference between this name and Soiphis. 

In the four first places in either list I find no 
coincidence in names ; but we have an historical 
synchronism which connects the commencements of 
the two series. 



*108 ANTIQUITY OF THEBES AND MEMPHIS. 

We are assured by Clement of Alexandria, that 
Hermes of Thebes, and iEsculapius of Memphis 
were two celebrated men, who obtained the honour of 
deification in consequence of the benefits conferred 
by them on mankind. We have in the foregoing 
pages endeavoured to ascertain what the deification of 
men meant in the fabulous history of the Egyptians. 
It does not appear that they had any apotheosis after 
the manner of the Greeks, but as hierarchs, or pro- 
phets, they were believed to partake of the divine 
nature of the gods to whom they dedicated themselves : 
they even assumed the names of their tutelar divinities, 
and were accordingly confounded in history with the 
gods themselves. It was thus that we have a second 
Hermes, and a second iEsculapius. The first 
Hermes, or Thoth, was an abstraction, the personi- 
fication of intellect or reason ; the first vEsculapius 
was Serapis, or Osiris. The second Thoth, or 
Hermes Trismegistus, was a real historical person ; 
he lived in the time of Athoth, or was, perhaps, 
Athoth himself. He was a Theban, according to 
Clemens. The second iEscuIapius was, according to 
Clemens, a Memphite; doubtless he was a priest. 
We here have his name as the second of the Mem- 
phite kings, who in the first ages seem generally to 
have arisen from the hierarchy. 

Now we learn from several authorities that the 
Memphite iEsculapius was contemporary with the 
Theban Hermes, though the former seems to have 
been the younger of the two, and to have assisted the 
Theban priest in the compilation of his works. 
Thus, Manethon is made to assure Ptolemy that he had 
copied certain records in the recesses of the Egyptian 



manethon's tables explained. *109 

temples, which the wise Hermes had inscribed there 
with the assistance of iEsculapius. 

xcc) xpiKplcov (TrrfkaiV, <xg SUpOLTO 7TOLU(ro<pog EpjU.% 
<ro^,£oi>Aov 7rivi>Tijg <ro<ptr}g y A(rxXr)7riov svpcuu. 

Manethon. A'potelesm, lib. v. 

In the Pcemander, the reputed work of Hermes 
Trismegistus, Tat, or Thoth, and ^Esculapius, are 
called the sons of Hermes. 

Julius Firmicus, also, in his astrological work, 
cites some ancient books attributed to Hermes, and 
to iEsculapius, who received his lessons. 

Other authorities might be accumulated to prove 
this synchronism, if it were necessary; but the above 
mentioned are sufficient to establish the fact, as far as 
a fact of such remote antiquity can be determined. 
The result is, that though the first names in these 
two successions do not resemble each other, yet we 
are in possession of the historical fact, that the second 
king in one table, was contemporary with the second 
in the other. 

To conclude, it seems to be tolerably well esta- 
blished, that the beginning and end of the two 
tables we have compared are contemporary ; that 
Athothes and Tosorthros lived in the same age, and 
that the queen Nitocris, at the end of the table, is the 
only sovereign of that name who reigned in Egypt. 
Further, when we proceed to examine the names of 
the intermediate kings, we find that the majority 
of them are such as, though sometimes differing in 
sound, appear to be merely modifications of the same 



*110 ANTIQUITY OF THEBES AND MEMPHIS. 

Egyptian originals ; in other instances, an exact 
correspondence in the lengths of reigns proves that 
the same kings have been recorded in the two lists 
with different titles or epithets. On the whole, 
when we take into consideration the remote period 
of antiquity from which these records have descended, 
the number of chronological compilers through whose 
hands they have passed, the great variety of names 
and titles often given to the same individuals, and 
the imperfection of alphabetical Writing, it must be 
allowed that we have found far more numerous coinci- 
dences than we had any right to expect in support 
of the supposition before adopted. We infer that 
these tables contain two coeval and almost identical 
successions. 

The coincidences which have led us to this con- 
clusion cannot be attributed to any design on the part 
of the authors to whom we owe the tables for it does 
not appear that either of them ever so much as con- 
jectured that the third, fourth, and sixth dynasties of 
Manethon were coeval with the first twenty-two 
reigns of Eratosthenes ; nor am I aware that the 
comparison on which this point is established has 
ever been made before. 

It, therefore, appears that the early part of Mane- 
thon's chronicle, instead of containing one continued 
series of kings, consists in reality of several coeval 
successions ; we find in the first place two dynasties 
of Thinite kings, the same series being continued by 
one dynasty of Elephant mites ; in the second we have 
the series of Memphite kings just enumerated ; 
thirdly, two dynasties ofHeracleots, and one of Xoites, 
the names in which arc lost; fourthly, the dynasties 



MANETHOtf's TABLES EXPLAINED. *H| 

of Shepherd kings, which appear to have been in part 
coeval with the foregoing series,, and fifthly we find 
the titles of several D!os t oIi(an dynasties, most of 
which are entirely lost, and the only one which 
remains is only another copy, as we have shown, of 
the nineteeenth dynasty, inserted in a later part of 
the Chronicle. To conclude, we have thus reconciled 
the apparently discordant schemes of Manethon on 
the one side, and the Old Chronicle and the laterculus 
of Eratosthenes on the other, since the longest succes- 
sion in these dynasties falls considerably within the 
lowest period allowed by the latter documents for the 
antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy. We have seen that 
Syncellus, professing to follow Eratosthenes, gives us 
data for fixing the beginning of the reign of Menes 
at 2662 B. C. and that the commencement of the 
Cynic circle, which answers to the same epoch in the 
Old Chronicle, must either be dated nearly at the 
same time, or 150 later. Now it is obvious that 
neither of the successions, in the first part of Mane- 
thon's Chronicle, exceeds the interval between these 
remote dates and the period already fixed for the era 
of the eighteenth dynasty, or of the Israelitish Exode. 
Manethon, therefore, is reconciled with the other 
authorities; but it must at the same time be allowed 
that we have not yet found in his Chronicle any means 
of computing the exact point of time at which we 
must date the commencement of the Egyptian history. 



*112 RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT PARTS. 



SECTION VII. 

Connection of the Earlier and Later Parts of the Egyptian 
Chronology, 

We shall now make an attempt to connect the 
commencement of the Chronicle with the later part, 
and to deduce from it some more exact conclusion 
respecting the antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy. 
We pursue the same method which we have hitherto 
followed, but place less confidence on the data to 
which we are obliged to resort in the remaining 
part of our calculation, than on those which have 
conducted us thus far. 

The agreement which we have already traced 
between the Memphite record in Manethon's Chro- 
nicle, and the series of Theban kings by Eratosthenes, 
may be considered as ascertaining the succession of 
Egyptian kings, from Menes downwards during 
nearly 700 years, to the reign of Nitocris. We had 
previously fixed the epoch of the departure of the 
Shepherds, and the commencement of the eighteenth 
dynasty, or the accession of Tethmosis, at 1679 years 
B. C. All that we now want is to find the interval 
that elapsed between the reigns of Nitocris and of 
Tethmosis, and then the outline of the Chronicle will 
be ascertained. 



OF manethon's chronicle. *113 

It is probable that Manethon's work, if it could be 
restored to its original state, would not differ mate- 
rially in this part of the computation from the Old 
Chronicle, which seems to have been the pattern on 
which it was formed. The following are the dates 
given by this document : — 



Years. 

The fifteen generations of the Cynic 

circle reigned 443 

The sixteenth dynasty 1 90 

The seventeenth dynasty . • . . . 103 

736 



Now, if we add 736 years to 1679 we shall have 
2415 B. C. for the era of the origin of the monarchy. 
But here a source of uncertainty falls in our way. 
For 178 years have been casually omitted in some 
part of the Old Chronicle, and an apprehension 
suggests itself that the lapse of the copyist may have 
happened in this part of the series. It would then be 
necessary to add this number to the foregoing, which 
would carry up the age of Menes to 2593 B. C. It 
is extremely difficult to determine which of these 
dates is the true one. Syncellus, indeed, has given 
us, for the commencement of the Laterculus of 
Eratosthenes, a date of 2662 years before Christ, but 
we are not informed whence he derived this calcula- 
tion. If we were sure that it was taken from Eratos- 
thenes, it would give support to the more remote 
computation of the era of the Old Chronicle, which 
differs from it only 69 years ; but it appears that the 

2 



*1!4 RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT 

original work of Eratosthenes was never seen by 
Synceltus, who extracted the table of Theban kings 
from the compilation of Apollodorus, and nothing 
is more probable than that his estimate of the 
antiquity of this series was taken from other and 
perhaps fallacious sources. 

There are some coincidences between the latter 
part of the Theban series of Eratosthenes and the 
eighteenth dynasty of Manethon, which falls within 
the epoch already determined. If these should 
appear considerable enough to be relied upon, they 
will afford a clue to all perplexities. 

We may in the first place remark, that those kings 
whose names are mentioned by Herodotus and 
Diodorus, as preceding the age of Sesostris, are, with 
few exceptions, found in the table of Eratosthenes. 
Herodotus has recorded only three reigns before that 
era, those of Menes, Nitocris, and Moiris, the immediate 
predecessor of Sesostris.* These seem to correspond 
with the Menes, Nitocris, and Maris of Eratosthenes. 
Diodorus mentions a king named Myris, or Muris, 
whom he places six generations earlier than the 
Moiris of Herodotus; and in the corresponding 
place in the laterculus we find the name of Meures. 
We shall exhibit these coincidences in one view. 

* This Moiris is an important person in history. He is 
mentioned by Strabo and JElian, the latter of whom termi 
him Marres. 



■I —■ ■ 



PARTS OF MANETHON'S CHRONICLE. 



*115 



Eratosthenes. 




Herodotus. 




Diodorus 


Mines 
I 


Me 


nes 




Menas 


J- 
Bums 

1 








Bousiris 


J ■ 

.Nitocns 

| 


Nit 


ocris 








Meures 








Muris 


1st generation 
2d generation 
3d generation 
4th generation 
5th generation 
«th Maris. 


Mo 

t( 

Ses 


ires, or Marres, as he is 
jrmed by Aelian. 

ostris. 


1st generation 
2d generation 
3d generation 
4th generation 
5th generation 
6th generation 

7 th Sesostris. 



It would seem, from the analogies which display 
themselves in this table, that Eratosthenes collected 
the materials with which he has compiled the series of 
Theban kings from the same quarter whence Hero- 
dotus and Diodorus obtained information. We may, 
therefore, attribute the discrepancies between these 
authors to the imperfect manner in which the two 
latter understood the accounts that were given them. 

Now, the Moiris of Herodotus, the Marres of 
iElian, was the immediate predecessor of Sesostris. 
Sesostris, according to Manethon, was also called 
iEgyptus; that is, he bore the appellation given to the 
sacred river of Egypt. In the table of Eratosthenes, 
we find just below Marres, and divided from it by 
only one name, a king called Phrouron, which is 
interpreted the Nile. This Phrouron appears, then, to 
be another name or epithet of the celebrated Sesostris. 
It ought immediately to follow Maris; and the name 
of Siphthas Hermes, which intervenes, should pro- 
bably have preceded Maris. If we are allowed to 



*116 RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT 

make this trifling alteration, we shall find a consistent 
analogy, in the order of names, between the three 
authors. 

Eratosthenes, Herodotus and Diodorus. 

1. Meures Muris. D. 

2. Chomaephtha 

3. Ancomiios 

4. Pente-Athyris 

5. St-Amenemes 

6. Sistosich-Hermes Sasyches. D. 

y t * * 

8. Siphthas-Hermes 

9. Maris . Moeris, or Marres, (H. and 

JElian) 
lp. Phrouron, or the Nile, Sesostris,, named also iEgyptus, 

or the Nile. 

Let us now compare this succession with the 
series of kings immediately preceding Sesostris, or 
iEgyptus, in the table of Manethon. 

The predecessor and father of Sesostris is called 
Moiris by Herodotus. By Manethon he is termed 
Amenophis. Whence this difference? The fact 
seems to be, that these names are equivalent. 

Maris, in the list of Eratosthenes, is interpreted 
Heliodotus, " the Gift of the Sun ;" and the same 
meaning may be ascribed to Amenophis; so that 
these epithets or titles may be considered as con- 
vertible. Memnon, or Mennon, as Pliny writes the 
name, is another way of expressing Amenophis ; for 
both these titles are given to another prince of the 
eighteenth dynasty, by Africanus. Memnon was 
the offspring of the Sun : it was his statue that was 
vocal when struck with the solar beams. 

Strabo confirms this supposition, by assuring us 



PARTS OF MANETHON'S CHRONICLE. 



*117 



that Mceris was the same king who was otherwise 
called Memnon, and whose statue was so famous 
among the Greeks. Memnon, or Mennon, or Ame- 
nophis, is therefore certainly,, in this instance, the 
same as Moiris ; and, as these names have the same 
meaning; it is probable that we shall find them 
coinciding in other instances. 

We shall now set down the three tables of Eratos- 
thenes, of Herodotus and Diodorus, and of Manethon, 
opposite to each other, and observe their coincidences. 



Eratosthenes, 


Herodotus and Dioa 


J orus, Manethon' s 18th Dynasty. 


*Thuosi-MARES 




*AMENOPHIS the 1st 


Thyrillus 




Miphris 


Semphoucrates 




Misphragmouthosis 


Chouther 




Touthmosis 


*MARES 


MURIS, D. 


*AMENOPHIS, or 
MEMNON 


Chomaephtha . 




Horus 


Ancounios 




Achen-cheres 


Pente-ATHYRIS 




ATHORIS 


St-Amenenes (23 years) 




(24 yrs.) Achencheres 1 & 2 


Sistosich-HERMES* 


Sasyches, P. 


ARMES, or Hermeub* 
Ramesses 


Siphthas-HERMES 




HARMESSES 


*MARIS 


MOIRIS or MARRES, *AMENOPHIS 




or MEMNON 




Phrouron, named after 


Sesostris 


Sethosis, named also 


the river Nile. 




iEgyptus, the name 
of the Nile 




Sesostris 2 


Rhapsakes 




Ammosis 


Amenophthis 




Actisanes 


Rameses 




*MARUS. 


•AMMENEMES. 



We observe that the name Muris, Meuris, IMoiris 
or Marres, or Myris, occurs four times in the series of 



*-118 RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT 

Eratosthenes, Diodorus, and Herodotus. In three 
places it corresponds with the name of Amenophis, 
which we have shown to be an equivalent epithet ; 
in the fourth with Arnenemes ; and Manethon, as we 
have shown in a foregoing section, sometimes has 
written Arnenemes in the place of Amenophes. 

Another coincidence is the occurrence of Hermes 
twice in the Theban list, opposite to Armes or Har- 
nesses in the list of Manethon. 

Pente-Athyris is a compound name, meaning 
P'hont-Athyri, or the high priest of Athyri or Athor. 
Opposite to this name we have Athoris, which is 
equivalent. 

If these coincidences are allowed to be sufficient to 
establish the connection of the two series, they will 
enable us to fix the date of the commencement of the 
Egyptian monarchy more exactly than we have 
attempted by the data before adduced. 

We have already shown that the beginning of the 
reign of Sesostris or iEgyptus is to be dated at 1350 
B. C. The whole series of Eratosthenes, from Menes 
to the last king whose name is set down, occupied, 
as Syncellus says, 1075 years. From this sum we 
must deduct 68 years, for the length of the two last 
reigns, and the interval between Menes and Phrouron 
will be 1007 years. Now, if this Phrouron, whose 
name is interpreted f( The Nile," be really the same 
as the yEgyptus or Sethosis of Manethon, we have 
only to add 1007 years to the date before obtained, 
in order to ascertain the time when Menes began 
to reign, and the record of the Egyptian monarchy 
commences. 1350+ 1007 amount to 2357. This date 
falls short of the lowest epoch deduced from the Old 



PARTS OF MANETHON'S CHRONICLE. *119 

Chronicle, by upwards of 50 years; but the difference 
is less than we might expect. 

If this computation is correct, Nitocris must have 
died just 40 years before the Exode, and Thyosi- 
Mares was the Amenophis who was drowned in the 
Red Sea. Perhaps some confirmation to our hypo- 
thesis will be found in the coiucidence of the date of 
this king's death. If we compute upwards from 
Nilus, supposing him identical with Sesostris, we find 
that the end of the reign of Thyosi- Mares falls just 6 
years before the Scriptural date of the Exode ; an 
error so small as this may be considered a remarkable 
instance of agreement. 

It must be remarked that if the coincidences noticed 
in this section should be regarded as merely accidental, 
the conclusions obtained in the preceding pages will 
be in no way affected ; and it may still be allowed 
that we have determined, with a tolerable degree of 
precision, the antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy, 
by comparing the Old Chronicle and that of Mane- 
thon with the laterculus of Eratosthenes. The analo- 
gies traced in the former sections appear to be so 
strong as to lie beyond the reach of merely accidental 
coincidence. This cannot be said of those which we 
have last surveyed ; though I confess that 1 am in- 
clined, on the whole, to regard even the latter as too 
distinct and too numerous to be the effect of chance. 

I shall now, in the following table, place under one 
view the whole system of the Egyptian chronicles, 
observing that the only point which to myself appears 
left in doubt, is the connection 1 have attempted 
to trace between the eighteenth dynasty of JManethon 
and the latter part of the Theban laterculus. 



*120 



TABLE OF MANETHON'S EGYPTIAN DYNASTIES, COM- 

OF ERATOSTHENES, DISPLAYING 



part 

FIRST PART OF THE CHRONICLE, 



Old Chronicle. 



Theban Kings, accord- 
ing to Eratosthenes. 



Memphite Dynasties of 
Manethon, being the 
3d, 4th, and 6th 
Dynasties. 



15 generations of the Menes 
Cynic Circle Athothes 



Necherophes 

| Hermes Thebanus Tosorthros, or iEscinV 
pius Memphites 

Athothes 2 Tyris 

i i 

Somphos Soi-phis 

Toigar Taser-tasis 

St-Oichos Achis 

Gosormies reigned 30 Siphouris reigned .. 30 

Mares 26 Kerpheres 2£ 

j (4th dynasty) 

Siroes Soris 

Saophis 1 Souphis 1 

Sum total of the 15 Sum of the first 

generations 443 1 5 generations 454 

16th dynasty of 8 Saophis 2 Souphis 2 

Tanites reigned 190 Mos-Cheris Men-Cheres 



(6th dynasty,) 



Apappos 100 Phiops 100 

Total, 633 Achescus 1 Mentesouphis 1 

17th dynasty of 4 Nitocris 6 Nitocris 12 

Memphites reign- — — 

ed 104 Total, 687 691 

737 

It would appear that some great revolution in Egypt about the 



PARTS OF MANETHON'S CHRONICLE. 



*121 



PARED WITH THE OLD CHRONICLE AND THE LATERCULUS 
THE CONTEMPORARY SUCCESSIONS. 

jftSt 

FROM MENES TO NITOCRIS. 



Thinite Dynasties of Kings of Elephantine, 

Manethon, being the being the 1st and 2d 

1st and 9>d Dynas- Dynasties, 
ties. 

Menes 
Athothes 



Kenkenes 

i 

Ou-Saphaes 



Xoites. 



Heracleois. 



The 14th dy- The 9th dy- 
nasty reign- nasty reign- 
ed 184 or 484 ed 100 or 409 
The 10th dy- 
nasty 185 

Total, 594 



(2d dynasty) 
Bochus 



[The date of the invasion of the 
Shepherds is determined by the follow- 
ing Table.] 



Sethenes 
Chaeres 

Nephercheres 
Sesochris 
Cheneres 

Sum total of these 
two dynasties ... 555 

[Perhaps these princes 
were driven from This to 
Elephantine. ] 



Ouser-Cheres 

Sephres 

Nepherchere9 

Sisiris 

Cheres 

Rathouris 

Mercheres 

Tarcheres 

Obnus 

Total, from Menes, 684 



same period occasioned the termination of several dynasties. The 

r 



122 



RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT 



following Table indicates that this was the increasing ascendancy 
and expulsion of the Shepherds. 

Part 

CONNECTION OF THE PRECEDING DYNASTIES WITH THE SUB- 
SUCCESSION OF KINGS FROM 

N. B. The foregoing table, as well as the succeeding one, is 
present is built on the supposition that Thyosi-Mares was the 






Old Chronicle. 



18 dynasty of 14Mem- 

phite Kings, reigned 

348 



Laterculus of Theban 
Kings. 



Diospolitan Record 
of Manethon. 

18th Diospolitan dy- 
nasty of Manethon — 
called Memphites in 
the Old Chronicle 



Nitocris 687 



Myrtaios 
Thyosi-Mares 

i 

Meures 

I 

Pente-Athuris 
Sistosich-Hermei 



Siphthas Hermes 
(Maris) 

Phrouron, who bore the 
name of the river 
Nile. 



Amenophis 1 

I 

Amenophis 2, the Muris 

of Diodorus 
Athoris 
Armes, or Hermeus 



Harmesses 

Amenophis 5, the Mar- 
res of iElian 

Sethosis, who bore the 
name of JEgyptus, or 
the river Nile. 



PARTS OF MANETHON'S CHRONICLE. *12S 



of the Diospolitan kings, who soon after effected the reduction 



SEQUENT ONES. THIS PART OF THE TABLE COMPRISES THE 
NITOCRIS TO SESOSTRIS. 

founded on the conclusions obtained in the sixth Section. The 
Amenophis 1 of Manethon, maintained in the seventh Section. 

Memphite Kings. 



Nitocris ,. 691 

[The 7th and 8th dynas- 
ties of Memphites are 
lost.] 



Exode of the Hebrew Shepherds, B.C. 1619, viz. 
511 years after the first incursion of the Shep- 
herds, who therefore entered Egypt B.C. 2071, 
viz. in the reign of Toigar, according to this 
Table. 



A duplicate Diospolitan 
record, being the 12th 
dynasty of Manethon. 

Ammenemes 

Sesostris 



[See page* 100. 



124 



RELATION OF THE DIFFERENT 



\ Part 

EGYPTIAN MONARCHS, FROM SETHOSIS, 



Old Chronicle. 



Manethon's Chronicle. 



19th dynasty of Diospolites com- 
menced 1084 years from the 
beginning of the Cynic Circle.* 



Total 194 
20th dynasty of Diospolites 
reigned , 228 

21 dynasty of Tanites 

Total 121 



Sethosis, the 1st king of the 19th dynasty, 
began to reign 1075 — 68=1007 years 
from Menes, according to the fore- 
going Table, founded on Section the 
seventh * 

Rhapsakes 

Amenophis 

Rameses (Troy taken) 

Ammenemmes 

Thouoris, or Polybus 

Total 209 

(20th dynasty of Diospolites) 

Total 135 

(2lst dynasty of Tanites) 

Smedes, or Soussakeim 

i 

Total 130 



22d dynasty of Tanites 




22d dynasty of Bubastites 






Total 


48 




Total 


49 


23d dynasty of Diospolites 




23d dynasty of Tanites 






Total 


19 




Total 


44 


24th dynasty of 1 Saite 




24th dynasty of 1 Saite 






reigned 


44 


Bocchoris reigned 




44 


25th dynasty of Ethiopians 




25th dynasty of Ethiopians 

Sabbaco 

Senechon 

Tarcus, or Taracus 






Total 


44 




Total 


44 


26th dynasty of Memphites 




26th dynasty of Saites 






Total 


177 


1 

Psammitichus 

Nechao 

Psammouthis 

Ouaphris 

Amasis. 







Note. It hence appears that the Old Chronicle carries up the 
which exceeds the date founded on the second part of this Table 



PARTS OF MANETHON's CHRONICLE. 



OR SESOSTRIS, TO AMASIS. 

Herodotus and Diodorus. 



Kings of Egypt mentioned 
in the Scriptures. 



*125 



Dates. 



1550 

B.C. 



Ammosis 

Ramises of Pliny (Troy taken) 

Marus 



118» 



Shishak 



989 



Bocchoris, D. 
Sabbacon 
Tearchon of Strabo 



fcJo 



Tirhakah the Ethiopian 



7«S 

710 



Psammitichus 

Nechus 

Psammis 

Apries 

Amasis. 



Pharaoh Necho 
Pharaoh Hophra 



Dates all 
ascertained. 



foundation of the Egyptian monarchy to 1084+ 1350 — 2434 B. C. 
by somewhat more than half a century. 



NOTES 



NOTE A. 



It has often been supposed that some memorials of the history 
of the worlds and of the most remarkable dispensations of 
Providence to the human race, had been preserved from very 
remote ages, particularly by the Patriarchs of the Hebrew 
stem ; and that Moses, in composing the introduction to the 
Pentateuch, availed himself of such authentic documents. 
The first writer who attempted to investigate this subject, by 
a critical analysis of the book of Genesis, was the celebrated 
physician, Astruc** The same inquiry has been pursued fur- 
ther by Jerusalemf and Ilgen,J and particularly by Eicbhorn;§ 
and the results which these writers have deduced have been 
generally adopted by learned men and biblical critics on the 
Continental 

These writers have attempted to show that the book of 
Genesis contains several ancient historical documents, handed 
down from the Patriarchs, and preserved in an uncorrupt state 

* Conjectures sur les Memoires originaux, clout il paroit que 
Moyse s'est servi pour composer le livre de la Genese, a Bruxelles, 
1753. 

f Jerusalem's Briefe iiber die Mosaische Geschichte und 
Philosophic 

X Ilgen's Urkunden des Jerusalemschen Tempel-Archivs. 

§ Eichhorn iiber MosisNachrichten von der Noachischen Fluth. 
Repertorium, T. 5. Also, Eichhorn's Einleitung in das Altc 
Testament, Th. 2. 

|| See D. J. G. Rosenmuller's Erklarung der Geschichte vom 
Siindenfall, and Paulus's Neues Repertorium, Th. '2. 



128 



NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL 



to the time of Moses, by whom they were copied nearly in 
their original form, except that they were interwoven by 
him into one continuous narrative. This inference is chiefly 
derived from the following considerations. 

1. The book of Genesis contains several repetitions or 
double narratives of the same events. 

2. If these duplicate narratives are compared with each 
other, they may be distinguished by characteristic differences 
of style. 

3. The repetitions are too extensive, and the characteristic 
differences too distinctly marked, to admit of any other expla- 
nation than that which this hypothesis assigns. 

As a specimen of this analysis, I shall subjoin Eichhorn's 
comparison of the two Histories of the Deluge, which this 
writer endeavours to trace and discriminate. It will be ob- 
served that the passages placed opposite to each other contain 
two complete and continued narratives. In one of these the 
Deity is distinguished by the term Eiohim, in the other by 
Jehovah ; and there is only one exception to this remark. 
The style differs in other respects. The record in which the 
word Eiohim is used is more prosaic and circumstantial ; the 
other is expressed more briefly, and in more striking and 
poetical phraseology. 



Record in which the name 
Jehovah is used. 

Genesis, chap. vi. 5. And Jehovah 
saw that the wickedness of man was 
great in the earth, and that every ima- 
gination of the thoughts of his heart 
was only evil continually. 

7. And Jehovah said, " I will de- 
stroy man, whom I have created, from 
the face of the earth, both man and 
beast, and the creeping tiling, and the 
fowls of the air ; for it repenteth me 
that I have made them." 

Chap. vii. 1. And Jehovah said unto 
Noah, " Because thee I have seen righ- 
teous before me in this generation." 



Record in which the word 
El o him is used. 

Genesis, chap. vi. 12. And the Eio- 
him saw the earth, and behold it was 
corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted 
his way upon the earth. 

13. And the Eiohim said unto Noah, 
" The end of all flesh is come before 
me ; for the earth is filled with vio- 
lence through them: and behold, I 
will destroy them from the earth." 

9. Noah was a just man and perfect 
in his generations ; and Noah walked 
with the Eiohim. 



TREATISE. NOTE A. 



*129 



Record in which the name 
Jehovah is used. 

Genesis, chap. vii. 2. Of every clean 
beast thou shalt take to thee, by sevens, 
the male and his female ; and of beasts 
unclean, by two, the male and his 
female. 

3. Of fowls also of the air by sevens, 
the male and the female, 



(B) to keep seed alive upon the face 
of all the earth. 

4. For yet seven days, and I will 
cause it to rain upon the earth forty 
days and forty nights : 

(B) and every living substance that 
I have made, will I destroy from off 
the face of the earth. 

5. And Noah did according to all 
that Jehovah had commanded him. 

1. And Jehovah said unto Noah, 
*' Come thou, and all thy house, into 
the ark." 

6. And Noah was six hundred years 
old when the flood of waters was upon 
the earth. 



(The time is specified in this record: see 
above, verse 4. ) 

7. And Noah entered, and his sons, 
and his wife, and his sons' wives with 
him, into the ark, because of the 
waters of the flood. 

8. Of clean beasts, and of beasts 
that are not clean, and of fowls, and 
of every thing that creepeth upon the 
earth, 



Record in which the word 
Elohim is used. 

Genesis, chap. vi. 19. And of every 
living thing, of all flesh, two of every 
sort shall thou bring into an ?-rk, to 
keep them alive with thee: they shall 
be male and female. 

20. Of fowls after their kind, and of 
cattle after their kind, of every creeping 
thing upon the earth after his kind: 
two of every sort shall come unto thee, 
(B) to keep them alive. 

17. And behold, I, even I, do bring 
a flood of waters upon the earth, 

(B) to destroy all flesh, wherein is the 
breath of life, from under heaven : every 
thing that is in the earth shall die. 

22. Thus did Noah ; according to all 
that the Elohim had commanded him, 
so did he. 

18. And thou shalt come into the 
ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, 
and thy sons' wives with thee. 

Chap. vii. 11. In the six hundredth 
year of Noah's life, in the second 
month, the seventeenth day of the 
month, the same day were all the foun- 
tains of the great deep broken up, 
and the windows of heaven were 
opened. 

12. And the rain was upon the 
earth forty days and forty nights. 

13. In the self same day entered 
Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and 
Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's 
wife, and the three wives of his sons 
with him, into the ark. 

14. They, and every beast after hie 
kind, and all the cattle after their 
kind, and every creeping thing that 
creepeth upon the earth after his kind, 
and every fowl after hi* kind, every 
bird of every sort. 



*130 



NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL 



Record in which the name 
Jehovah is used. 

Genesis chap. vi. 9. There went in, 
two and two, unto Noah into the ark, 



( B) the male and female, as the Elohim 
had commanded Noah. 

17. And the flood was forty days 
the earth ; and the waters increased 
and bare up the ark, and it was lift up 
above the earth. 

23. And every living substance was 
destroyed which was upon the face of 
the ground, both man, and cattle, and 
the creeping things, and the fowl of the 
heaven ; and they were destroyed from 
the earth : and Noah only remained, 
and they that were with him in the ark. 

Chap. viii. 21. And Jehovah said in 
his heart, 

I will not again curse the ground any 
more for man's sake ; because the 
imagination of man's heart is evil 
from his youth. 



(B) Neither will I again any more 
smite every living thing, as I have 
done. 

22. As yet all the days of the earth, 
seed-time and harvest, and cold and 
heat, and summer and winter, and day 
and night shall not cease. 



Record in which the word 
Elohim is used. 

Genesis chap. vi. 15. And they went 
in unto Noah into the ark, two and 
two of all flesh wherein is the breath 
of life. 

( B) 16. And they that went in, went in 
male and female of all flesh, as the 
Elohim had commanded him. 

18. And the waters prevailed, and 
were increased greatly upon the earth 
and the ark went upon the face of the 
waters. 

21. And all flesh died that moved 
upon the earth, both of fowl and of 
cattle, and of beasts, and of every 
creeping thing that creepeth upon the 
earth, and every man. 

22. All in whose nostrils was the 
breath of life, and all that was in the 
dry land died. 

Chap. ix. 8. And the Elohim said to 
Noah and to his sons with him, saying, 

9. And I, behold, I establish my 
covenant with you, and with your seed 
after you ; (10.) and with every living 
creature that is with you, of the fowl, 
of the cattle, and of every beast of the 
earth with you ; from all that go out 
of the ark, to every beast of the earth. 
(11.) And I will establish my cove- 
nant with you. 

(B) Neither shall all flesh be cutoff 
any more by the waters of a flood; 
neither shall there be any more flood 
to destroy the earth. 



The selection of the passages which are thus brought into 
comparison is perhaps, in some instances, forced and assumed 
without sufficient marks of discrimination. Yet, after making 
all allowances for critical artifice, it seems impossible to 
deny that there is some foundation for the author's hypothesis. 



TREATISE. NOTE B. *131 

I leave the reader, however, to examine for himself, and draw 
his own conclusions.* 



NOTE B. 

In assigning the dates to two or three events irf the history of 
the Israelites, I have followed a computation which differs from 
that of Archbishop Usher. The events I allude to are occur- 
rences, in which the history of the Hebrews is involved with 
the affairs of the Egyptians. The first of these is the Exode, 
or the departure of Israel from Egypt, under the guidance of 
Moses and Aaron. The second is the invasion of Judaea and 
capture of Jerusalem by the king of Egypt, termed in our 
sacred Scriptures Shishak. I shall mention the grounds on 
which the dates assigned to these occurrences appear to me to 
be established, beginning, as before, with the later, and then 
proceeding to the earlier events. 

First, of the date assigned to the invasion of Palestine by 
Shishak. 

Jerusalem was plundered by Shishak in the fifth year of 
Rehoboam, who ascended the throne of David thirty-six years 
after the foundation of the temple of Jerusalem. We have 
here two remarkable epochas in the history of the Israelites 
connected together, viz. the foundation of Solomon's temple, 
which fixes the commencement of a celebrated era; and the 

* For a full elucidation of this subject, I refer the reader to a 
work which is now preparing for the press by the Rev. D. G. 
Wait, LL.B. Rector of Blagdon, Somersetshire, under the title of 
An Introduction to the Old Testament. It is designed to contain 
a variety of curious illustrations derived from oriental sources, with 
the principal remarks of the Rabbinical Commentators, and the 
most learned German Critics. The profound erudition and inde- 
fatigable diligence of the author leave no room to doubt that this 
work will make a very valuable addition to the biblical literature 
of our nation. 



*J32 NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL 

revolt of the ten tribes, which happened in the first year of 
Rehoboam. 

The temple of Jerusalem was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar 
in the year before Christ 588, according to. Usher and most of 
our modern chronologers. This epoch is tolerably well fixed 
by a variety of historical data. By computing upwards from 
this era, and reckoning the reigns of the kings of Judah and 
Israel, as set down in the books of Kings and Chronicles, the 
earlier dates are obtained. By this method Usher has calcu- 
lated the interval between the foundation and the destruction 
of the temple to have been 424 years, and dates its foundation 
in 1012 B.C. In the computation I have followed, which is 
that adopted by Dr. Hales,* fifteen years are added to the 
period above mentioned, and the foundation of the temple is 
dated at 1027 B.C. 

This difference consists in the two following particulars. 

The reign of Jehoram, the fifth descendant of Solomon, as 
set down in 2 Kings, xiii. 17, and 2 Chronicles, xxi. 5, is 
eight years. Usher conjectures that half of his reign was a joint 
sovereignty with his father Jehojshaphat, and on this hypo- 
thesis has assigned only four years to Jehoram. Dr. Jackson 
has discussed this subject in his Chronological Antiquities, and 
I follow him in assigning eight years to this reign.f 

The other deviation from Usher's computation consists in 
the insertion of an interregnum of eleven years between the 
reigns of Amaziah and Azariah, for which we are fully autho- 
rized by a comparison of the contemporary successions of 
Judah and Israel ; unless an hypothesis assumed by Usher, 
similar to that of the former instance, be allowed. According 
to 2 Kings, xv. 1, Jeroboam the 2d was in the 27th year of 
his reign over Israel when Azariah ascended the throne of 
Jerusalem. Usher reckons this to have been the sixteenth 
year of his reign, and conjectures that the first eleven years 
were in joint sovereignty with his father Jehoash, whose whole 

* New Analysis of Chronology, vol. i. 
f Jackson's Chronological Antiquities, vol. i. p. 177- 



TREATISE. NOTE B. * 133 

reign was only sixteen years. There is no authority for this 
conjecture, neither is there any proof that the interregnum of 
eleven years preceded the reign of Azariah ; but one of the 
two suppositions must be allowed. The hypothesis that an 
interregnum took place is rendered probable by the circum- 
stances of Amaziah's demise, and seems implied in the account 
of Azariah's succession in 2 Chronicles, xxvi. 1. And we have 
shortly afterwards an instance of a similar chasm in the suc- 
cession of the kings of Israel, which is allowed by all chrono- 
logers, and certainly happened, yet is not expressly noticed 
in the series of reigns. 

We thus deduce the following dates from the Scriptural 
history. 

Years. 

Foundation of Solomon's temple, B.C. 1027 

Accession of Rehoboam 990 

Invasion of Judaea and sacking of Jerusalem by 
Sbishak 985 

Another important era in the Scripture Chronology is the 
Exode, or the departure of the Israelites from Egypt. The 
computation of this date depends on the duration we assign to 
the period between the foundation of the temple of Jerusalem 
and the Exode. 

Archbishop Usher's calculation of this interval, which is 
supported by the present Hebrew text, assigns to it 480 years. 
Several considerations seem to render it manifest that this date 
has been altered, either by fraud or accident. 

1. It is inconsistent with the tenour of the ancient Jewish 
history, as contained in the preceding scriptures. In the 
book of Judges, a series of rulers is set down, with an exact 
enumeration of their reigns or periods of government, which 
implies that they held the office of suffetes, or chief magistrates, 
in consecutive order. There is not time enough for the 
reigns of the whole number in succession, including the 
years of servitude, when Israel was subject to foreign 
oppressors, if the short date above mentioned is retained ; and 



*I34 NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL 

chronologers have been driven to the expedient of conjec- 
turing, contrary to the tenour of the history, that the reigns 
of several judges were contemporary. 

2. The longer computation is the best supported by ancient 
authorities. Josephus assigns five hundred and ninety-two 
years as the duration of the interval between the Exode and 
the foundation of the temple. This calculation seems to have 
been generally adopted by the learned among the Jews, about 
the time of the Christian era; and St. Paul appears to have 
followed it in the brief outline of the history of Israel, which 
occurs in Acts xiii. 17, 22. It is adopted by Michaelis as the 
true date. 

3. The only specious objection to this longer computation 
is founded on the genealogy of the house of Jesse, in the 
last chapter of Ruth, which gives only eleven generations, 
inclusive, between Judith and David. These, according to the 
usual allowance of three generations to a century, give us 
only three hundred and sixty years between the patriarch of the 
tribe and the founder of the royal house. But, if we refer to the 
books of Chronicles, we shall find several genealogies consisting 
of a much greater number of generations. In the house of 
the high priests we have fifteeen generations inclusive, 
betweed Aaron and Azariah, who was contemporary with 
Solomon ; and in the house of Samuel, we find seventeen 
generations between Korah and Samuel, which will give 
twenty between Korah and Solomon. It is evident, there- 
fore, that we must not take the singularly short genealogy 
of the house of Judah as the basis of our computation, which 
would be to found the rule on the exception. In the case of 
this short series, we must suppose, either that some genera- 
tions are omitted in the genealogy, a thing by no means 
infrequent in the practice of the Hebrew genealogists,* or 

* See Michaelis de Chronologia Mosis post Diluvium, and 
Observations en titled " Erinnerungen iiber Michaelis meinung 
van der Chronologic zwischen Sem und Abraham/' in EichhornV 
Repert. fur Bibl. unci Morgen. Litt. 13 Th. 



TREATISE. NOTE C. *135 

that the generations in this house were, from some circum- 
stances unknown to us, unusually long. This supposition is 
by no means improbable, or contrary to the tenour of events 
in the present times. We might select many families in 
which three generations will lead us back much more than a 
century. 



NOTE C. 

In assigning the date of the Trojan war, I have followed the 
old calculation of Eratosthenes, with which the ancients in 
general agree within a short period. This calculation appears 
to me to rest on better ground than any of the conjectural 
computations, founded on the supposed average-length of 
reigns. The assumption on which this method is founded 
has been completely defeated by Dr. Musgrave, in his inge- 
nious Dissertation on the Chronology of the Olympiad. 

The royal genealogy of England, or line of kings, from 
William the Conqueror to George III. gives us twenty-three 
generations, and the period elapsed since the epoch of the 
conquest is seven hundred and fifty-one years ; viz. from 
1066 to 1817. If we divide this number by twenty-three, we 
shall obtain thirty-two years and a half for each generation. 
Hence it appears that the length of reigns in a regal succession, 
when the crown is handed down regularly from father to son. 
may be nearly as long as the usually assigned average of 
generations., viz. three to a century. 

The most specious argument against the old computation 
of the date of the Trojan war is founded on the list of Kings 
of Sparta* The following is the table as drawn out by 
Falconer, from Pausanias and Herodotus,* 

* See the accurate and excellent work entitled u Chronok- 
Tables," by the late Mr. Falconer. 



136 



NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL 



TABLE OF THE KINGS OF SPARTA, FROM 
PAUSANIAS AND HERODOTUS. 



Eurysthenes . 

' : i 

Agis 

Echestratus 

Leobotes 

I 

Doryssus 

Agesilaus 

Archelaus 

Teleclus 

Alcamenes 

i 

Polydorus 
Eury crates 
Anaxander 

I 

Eurycratides 

Leon 

An axand rides 



42 



Hercules 

I 

Hyllus 

I 
Cleodaeus 

I 

Aristomachus 

I 

Aristodemus 

Patrocles, or Procles 

Sous 

Eurypon 

Pry tan is 

Eunomus 



Polydectes 

Charilaus 

Nicander 

l 

Theopompus 



r 



Arcleidamas 
Zeuxidamus 
Anaxidamus 

I 

Archidamus 

. .1 

Agasicles 
Aristo 

l 

Demaratus 



Lycurgus 



Cleomene8 Leonidas 



Anaxandrides 

I 

Arcleidamas 

i 

Anaxilaus 

Leotychides 

Hippocratides 

Agesilaus 

Men ares 

Leotychides 



TREATISE. NOTE C. *137 

Hyllus was contemporary with the heroes who fought at 
Troy, and the taking of Troy may be reckoned as coeval with 
his death. The death of Leonidas happened 480 B. C. while 
Leotychides reigned in the house of Procles. We have, 
therefore, (reckoning the last generation as half spent at the 
death of Leonidas,) 20 J generations between the Trojan war, 
dated at 1183 B.C. and the year 4S0, giving 703 years to be 
divided by 20|, which affords somewhat more than 34 years 
for each generation. In the line of Eurysthenes there are 
only 19 \ generations, and the average will be somewhat 
longer than those of our English series ; but they are by no 
means beyond the bounds of nature and of probability. The 
difference in manners in the two nations, with respect to 
marriages and other circumstances, will account for this 
variation, and a minute inspection of the Spartan series 
affords, as Dr. Musgrave has shown, several reasons why the 
average is greater than usual. For example, Charilaus, who 
reigned sixty-four years, was born after his father's death. 

This computation is supported by some historical notices 
which seem to be of good authority. Before the Olympic 
era, the Grecian chronology is subject to doubt and uncer- 
tainty; but, from the period when the calculation by Olympiads 
began, it may in general be trusted, and it appears that the 
best of the. old antiquaries relied with confidence on the 
register of the Olympiads. The beginning of the Messenian 
war was fixed by Pausanias at the second year of the ninth 
Olympiad, in the reigns of Theopompos and Alcamenes. 
These kings, therefore, reigned in 743 B.C. and this is the 
place which the above computation assigns them in the 
series. 743 taken from 1183, leave 440 years, which are to be 
divided between twelve reigns. One of these reigns is of an 
uncommon character, as before mentioned. Charilaus's reign 
is reckoned from his father's death before his own birth ; the 
period assigned to it is therefore longer than ought fairly to be 
allowed to a generation ; deduct 64 from 4 10, and we have 376 
to be divided between eleven reigns, which gives a little more 
than 34 years to each. We are informed that these reigns were 



*138 NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL TREATISE. 

actual generations in lineal succession; and therefore the 
average is within the limit of probability. 

On the whole, we may conclude that the old date of the 
Trojan war may be considered as resting on the authenticity 
of the Olympiad chronology, which Dr. Musgrave seems to 
have rescued from all doubt. 

The fallacy of the attempt to guess at Chronological facts 
by means of the average length of reigns is placed in the 
strongest point of view, by applying it to a few particular 
instances. If we take an average of the kings of France, from 
the time of Henry IV T . we shall find that they continued 
upwards of forty years, one with another. Let us apply this 
average to the Emperors of Rome. The number of reigns 
from Caesar Augustus to Augustulus was sixty-two, and the 
latter prince fell in the year 4J6. Calculate on the average 
above deduced, and Augustus must be computed to have 
begun his reign 2004 years B. C. Even if we adopt Sir Isaac 
Newton's average of twenty years, we shall place him a thou- 
sand years before his real time. On the other hand, we should 
shorten the English and French history in a like degree, if we 
calculate its duration by an average deduced from the Roman. 
We may conclude that this method of calculating the duration 
of reigns in one country, from a rule formed by the succession 
in another, is likely to lead us into great errors, especially if we 
apply to an hereditary unbroken series, an estimate drawn 
from the mutable succession in more turbulent governments. 



THE END, 



Printed by Browne & Manchee, Bristol. 



DIRECTIONS FOR PLACING THE PLATES. 

Plate I. opposite the title-page. 

II. page 53. 

III. 58. 

IV. 78. 

V. 88. 

IV. 126. 



Crrata* 

Page 21, line 23, " voc. /^sya," omis. post fovctrou. 

23, — 11, « ofov," lege Ihv. 

• 26, — 3, (C caudens," — candens. 

32, — 7, "or," — no. 

66, — 10, "a," — an. 

131, — 22, « at," — ut. 

-— 249, — 10 from bottom, add they, at the beginning 

of the line. 
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